God Told Me To (6 page)

Jordan was driving.

“This is our fourth day, Nicholas.”

Nicholas stared out the window.

“We’ll be pulled if we don’t give Hendriks something to stick his dick into.”

Nicholas stared.

“When you retire you might consider hiring yourself out as a lamp post. So listen to me. I got an idea. We’ve been checking out the slayers. Maybe that’s the wrong approach. Maybe we should run down the victims. I mean maybe there’s a political group or vigilantes or whatever behind this. They’re covering themselves by killing a lot of people just to get the one or two they want. Suppose one of Gorman’s victims was involved with one of Fletcher’s. See what I’m gettin’ at?”

“Gorman was too high up to distinguish one person from another.”

“Rifle had a scope. Suppose he knew when a person was going to be at a certain corner. Knew the jacket color that person would be wearing. Or the skin color.”

Silence.

“Gorman shot only one black. Know who? One of the biggest drug dealers in Harlem.”

It occurred to Nicholas that the idea was possibly sufficient to cajole more time out of Hendriks.

“We’ll start on them tomorrow.”

“Why not now?”

“Okay.”

“We’ll start by going to their old addresses. Hell, if nothing else we might find ourselves a nice apartment to rent.”

Nicholas ordered, “Pull over.”

Jordan pulled to the curb. He saw why Nicholas had ordered the halt and groaned, “For Christ’s sake. It’s another church.”

“I’ll be back soon.”

“We got a separation ’tween church and state in this country. You’re supposed to be working for the fuckin’ state.”

Nicholas had been almost out of the car. He slid back in and slammed the door. He grabbed Jordan’s jacket lapel and yanked the man down.

“Look! You rattle anything you want. Just lay off my religion. I haven’t said a damn word about that purple Continental we keep running into. I will, Jordan, believe me I will if you . . .”

Nicholas left the car.

Jordan chuckled. He threw a cigarette into his mouth, lit it, and chuckled again. He had lost count of how many times Nicholas had run into a church. The man was damn near a fanatic.

He leaned back, dragged on his smoke, wondered what he should tell Hendriks. He had started this thing thinking Nicholas was on to something big. Now he wasn’t so sure. There wasn’t much reason for Nicholas to continue holding back. Unless of course he figured on waiting another week and pulling one of his single-handed spectacular bits. Jordan knew Hendriks would give more time—providing he laced his report to him with the right lies. The hours were long but simple. No hassle. And in an odd way he’d come to like Nicholas. He puffed his cigarette and thought.

A chauffeur-driven Continental limousine pulled close alongside Jordan. The limousine halted only long enough for the smoke-tinted rear window to lower and for an envelope to sail from it through the open window of Jordan’s car.

Jordan laughed. He didn’t open the envelope. He knew what was in it and shoved it into an inside jacket pocket.

He said aloud, his voice amused, “You’re gettin’ too jiveass, Zero.”

He threw away his cigarette and followed the limousine. He caught up with it and signaled it to a side street where both cars parked.

The limousine smelled of sweet cologne. The black man who sat in the rear seat wore dark glasses, an orange shirt open nearly to the waist and exposing a hairless chest, a white suit and two-tone shoes. He smoked an ivory-holdered cigarette and was sipping something on the rocks. A short-trimmed mustache angled over his mouth like an inverted
V.
He was watching stock market reports flash across a small television screen and he didn’t look up as Jordan slid in beside him.

“Hello, Zero.”

“What you want, Jordan?”

“Car like this.”

“Work for it.”

Jordan sneered. “With drugs and broads.”

The black man kept his eyes on the TV. “You just got yourself an envelope full o’ drugs an’ broads. That suit of yours. That don’t look like no po’ boy’s suit.”

“My partner’s made you. You’ve crossed our path half a dozen times. Why?”

The black man wasn’t in a hurry. He puffed on his cigarette and sipped his drink.

“We’re concerned, Jordan. Want to know what your game is. You all of a sudden are working with Detective Lieutenant Peter Nicholas. Mr. Straight. Mr. Gangbuster himself. We are curious.”

Jordan laughed. “Relax. It’s a special assignment.”

“How special?”

“Nothing with you. Christ! Where you getting your ideas? We haven’t gone anywhere near uptown.”

“Some very important people, associates of mine, live in Suffolk County. You been in and around their neighborhoods.”

“So you know what we were asking about.”

“Don’t make sense, Nicholas being out there.”

“Just relax and don’t let Nicholas spot you again.”

The black man grinned and the inverted
V
above his lip became a flat dark scar.

“Mr. Jordan, I had to deliver your envelope.”

Jordan growled. “Don’t pull a stunt like that again. I got my drop.”

“You missed it last night. We worried. Don’t want me to drop it at your place of residence, do you?”

Anger entered Jordan’s voice. “Don’t ever come near my home. I’ll fucking shoot you on sight.”

The black man turned. He raised his dark glasses and looked into the detective’s eyes.

“Listen, pig. You are on my payroll. Only you are just a middleman. If I knew who you took orders from, you would be a dead man.”

Nicholas was stiff and mute in the confessional.

The priest on the other side of the grill wheezed and cleared his throat constantly but didn’t ask anything.

He pushed his hands hard against his forehead, as if to squeeze out what he meant to say. He was blocked. It was ironic. When he’d been a kid he used to go distances to find a priest who didn’t try to worm things out of him in confession.

He began again. “Bless me, Father, for . . .” and his voice trailed off.

It was almost funny. Twenty years too late he’d come upon the perfect confessor for an adolescent. I’m a troubled cop not a—the name Giacanna came to mind. Father Giacanna. Fresh from Italy. He could barely speak English. If you said jerk off instead of masturbate he thought you’d been shoplifting and gave a light penance.

The priest cleared his throat.

“Father?”

“Yes.”

He still couldn’t find his voice.

He remembered his toughest confessor. An old Irishman. Couldn’t put anything past him. A single profanity and he’d have you on your knees for two hours.

“My son, it is confession you want?”

“Yes, I . . .”

The priest wheezed.

“Please, my son.”

“Father, when God sent us His Son . . .”

“What is really troubling you? Perhaps you desire counseling.”

“When . . . when Jesus came on the earth. He came as a God of Love. And he was mur—crucified. Suppose he came back again as a God of Hate.”

“You will have to speak clearer. I don’t understand you.”

He raised his voice. “Father, suppose God, like everybody else, learns from experience.”

“What?”

“God learns.”

An edge came into the priest’s voice. “Be careful, son. You are approaching heresy.”

Now that he had begun, Nicholas went eagerly ahead.

“The Old Testament is full of blood and fury. According to those scriptures, God has murdered and maimed people. He’s created since the dawn of time.”

“The Devil! You are speaking of the Devil.”

“Father. We have always overlooked one possibility. Suppose God and the Devil are the same.”

“Leave here!” the priest shrilled. “I won’t hear this. You are not seeking absolution.”

The teller in the Staten Island bank left his window in the middle of a transaction. He made no explanation to the customer whose deposit slip he had already stamped, nor did he speak to any of his co-workers. He took his car from the parking lot and drove approximately one mile to a public grade school, making one stop at a gas station along the way. He drove without haste, but distractedly, and at one point he nearly ran a red light.

His name was Michael Jennings. He was twenty-six years old. He had thin features, a blond mustache, brown eyes, and neatly styled sand-colored hair. He was considered a shy person by most who knew him. He was a homosexual, though not many of his acquaintances were aware of this, and he had lived quietly with the same lover for three years
.

He arrived at the school shortly after classes had broken for the day. A number of young children were about to cross the street. A crosswalk guard raised a paddle that read
STOP.
Instead of stopping, Michael Jennings floored the gas pedal of his car.

The psychiatrist paced back and forth. He sometimes stopped to shuffle papers on his desk. Every few minutes he would remove his glasses and wipe them with a tissue.

Detective Jordan asked, “Doctor, what are you hiding from us?”

The psychiatrist blinked at the policeman’s accusing tone. “You’ve no right to speak with me that way,” he said in a skittering, high-pitched voice. “I’ve told you what, what I feel is everything.”

“Then let us see Michael Jennings,” said Nicholas. He was out of patience with the psychiatrist. The man had made them wait nearly an hour before seeing them. He then proceeded to weave evasive circles around all they asked him. But what bothered Nicholas more than the psychiatrist’s odd reluctance to speak was that so much time had passed between Jennings’ driving into the children and Nicholas’s learning of the incident.

The psychiatrist said, “I can’t allow you to see him. He’s a patient under close observation.”

Jordan’s affable manner had given way after fifteen minutes of the psychiatrist’s evasion. “Look, Doctor, we’re investigating a series of related homicides. You are interfering with our investigation.”

The psychiatrist threw out his arms. “Nonsense! Michael Jennings is simply a man who suddenly went berserk. It happens! Thank God it doesn’t happen often, but—”

“Let us see him,” Jordan interrupted. “We’ll decide if it’s nonsense.”

“You men haven’t told me a thing. Perhaps if I knew what you’re investigating . . .”

“You spoke with him, didn’t you, Doctor?” Nicholas said.

“I examined him. Nobody spoke with him. I’ve told you that! I’ve explained that the reason the arresting officers brought him here was because he was in a near-catatonic state. He wouldn’t or couldn’t speak. It was all done in proper manner. A judge had given the permission, that signed the papers, allowing me to do what I felt necessary. I behaved accordingly.”

“Why did you examine him alone?” asked Nicholas. “Didn’t you think it important an officer should be there if Jennings made a statement?”

“I don’t like people looking over my shoulder. I’ve explained that.”

Jordan exploded. “Then explain why you kept us waiting a fucking hour! Explain what you’re afraid of.”

The psychiatrist paced back and forth. “I’m a busy man. What the hell do you think running a place like this is? Look, if it’ll be any help to you, I can tell you Jennings was a homosexual.”

Nicholas and Jordan looked at each other. Jordan rolled his eyes in disgust.

Nicholas said, “If he didn’t speak, Doctor, how do you know he’s gay? And why do you keep saying
was?
He’s not dead, is he?”

“He might as well be. I doubt if he’ll ever come out of the state he’s in. When the police picked him up yesterday there was an identity card. Whom to call in case of an emergency. Police called and got the man, the lover.”

Nicholas broke in, “We talked to the lover! He’s in your outer office waiting to see you.”

“Yes, I know that. Of course, I know that. I thought you people should be seen first. I . . .”

“We used your phone and talked to other people while you kept us hanging. We got the latest statistics on Jennings’ victims. A fourth child died. Another child is never going to walk. A mother trying to save her kid lost an arm. The crosswalk guard never made it home last night to cook her husband’s dinner. Now you tell us what Jennings said. Because I damn well know he talked to you.”

“Look here, I am—”

“You look!” snapped Jordan. “You give us the straight story or we’ll see to it there’s a court investigation.”

The birdlike voice squealed, “Don’t threaten me!”

“It’s a fucking promise, Doc.”

The psychiatrist turned and went to the window. He raised a blind. The window was gray and streaked and he stared out at a gray Staten Island landscape. He toyed with the pull cord of the blind while he talked, never facing the detectives.

“This is off the record. If it helps you with your investigation, fine. But I’ll deny it under oath if it ever comes back to me. Mind you, I’ve done nothing wrong. When the police wheeled Jennings in, I took one look and his eyes were wide open. Not unusual in such cases. But your average patient, you can tell isn’t seeing anything. It’s simply a blank stare. With Jennings, it’s difficult to describe. There was an innocence in his expression. I got the impression he saw me and was trying to draw me inside of himself.

“I had to be alone with him. I was sure I could reach him, but it had to be him and me alone.

“There are certain shots which sometimes work in such cases. I knew the usual methods wouldn’t work. I gave him insulin. Our procedure here is for a minimum of three concurring opinions before any type of shock treatment be given. This was, though, and I emphasize this, a highly unusual case. I believed there was only a short time in which I could reach him. I did not call in my colleagues and made the decision to use insulin on my own.

“He reacted almost instantaneously to the shot. Not in any normal way. Nor any way I’ve heard about. His body stiffened in the usual fashion, but briefly, much too briefly. Then his eyes opened. That is, his eyes focused. Were it not for the restraining straps, I believe he might had sat up. He smiled. An odd smile. If either of you are familiar with the painter Botticelli you know the smile.