Mission (26 page)

The phone jerked me from my own private Limbo. Linda had Jeff Fowler on the line. I told her to put him through.

‘Hi, Jeff. How's it going?'

‘Fine,' he said.

‘Good. How d'you make out with Carol?'

‘Okay,' he said. ‘You did me a real favour there. Are you going to be free later tonight? Say eight-thirty to nine?'

‘I'll be at home,' I replied. ‘What was it you wanted to see me about?'

‘Blood,' he said. And rang off. Just like that.

I put the phone down with a sense of foreboding then picked it up again and asked Linda to try and get hold of Miriam or, failing that, to leave a message asking her to ring me. I tried hard to concentrate on the pile of paperwork in front of me but the words wouldn't register in my brain.

Miriam rang back just before six. I told her about Fowler's cryptic phone call. ‘Have you any idea what it's about?'

‘Nope,' said Miriam. ‘I haven't seen him since we took him out to dinner with your ex-playmate Carol.'

I tried to figure out what that little shaft signified, then gave up. ‘Are you going to be able to come round?'

‘Uh-uh,' she said. ‘I've got a date I can't break. I'm going out with a bunch of the guys to celebrate Ken Gallow's appointment as head of the teaching faculty. I told you about it, remember?'

‘Oh, yes, Ken Gallow,' I said, with snide matter-of-factness. ‘
Your
ex-playmate.'

She drove on over it. ‘You can handle Fowler. If he get's too close
for comfort, pick him up on some technical point and pretend you don't understand. With luck, he'll launch into a lecture and lose track of what he was talking about. If not, tell him some more lies. You're very good at that.'

I think it was a compliment, but it sounded like game, set and match.

When I reached my apartment at a quarter-past-eight, the first thing I did was to sink a good three fingers of bourbon. The idea was to totally bomb my neuro-muscular system so that I could listen to whatever Jeff Fowler had to say without any outward demonstration of surprise, alarm or dismay.

Fowler hit the entry-phone button at eight-thirty on the nose. I told him to come up and readied a Jack Daniels. We settled in a couple of armchairs and I staved off the evil moment with some mild
badinage
about Carol Shiragawa who, I omitted to say, (although it must now be obvious), is half-Japanese, stands as tall as Iowa corn (her father comes from Cedar Falls) and works as a reservation clerk for J.A.L. So – anyway, we finally got to it and I found myself regretting that The Man had not seen fit to help me out by arranging to have a wayward elevator cleave friend Fowler in two.

‘Blood,' I said.

‘That's right.' Fowler put his glass down with a delicately raised forefinger and pulled out a thin, Clint Eastwood cheroot. It looked ridiculous sticking out of his rather soft, doughy face but what the hell – we all dream, don't we? Fowler lit the cheroot with some ceremony then pointed it at me. ‘You are never going to believe this. I mean, it is
weird.
No, really.'

‘Sounds good,' I said. ‘Why don't you run it by me?'

He retrieved his glass, took a thoughtful drag on the cheroot and massaged his forehead. ‘Six-thirty, Tuesday evening, a Spanish priest turned up at the lab. Ordinarily, I wouldn't have known about it. It just so happened that he went down the wrong corridor and I met him on the way out of my section. Well, as we don't get many priests in our neck of the woods, I asked him what he wanted. He told me that he had a sample of liquid that he thought might be blood and wanted to have it analysed. I explained that he'd come to the wrong place and that we were actually a specialist research unit. I mean, that thing I did for you and Miriam was a one-off.'

I nodded. ‘Sure …'

‘So the priest says, “This is special. It's from a statue.” '

‘You're kidding,' I said.

Fowler stabbed his cheroot in my direction. ‘My words exactly. So the next thing he does is produce a small corked phial and two colour Polaroids of a statue about fifteen or so inches high.'

‘A statue of what?' I asked.

‘Jesus Christ nailed to the cross,' said Fowler. ‘You know, the usual thing. You see them all over Mexico. Made of plaster and painted with enamel. This particular one happens to come from Cuba. It's a family heirloom. Over a hundred years old.'

A bell rang at the back of my mind but the memory circuits failed to connect. ‘And this statue is bleeding?'

Fowler sipped some JD and nodded. ‘From the head, side, hands and feet. Absolutely amazing. I've been round to see it myself. I've even had it off the wall. There are no pumps or tubes, or anything like that. The only possible way to fake it would be by a sealed unit inside. And the only way to check that would be to break it open, or to have it X-rayed. But the family won't let it out of the house.'

‘That figures,' I said.

Fowler shook his head. ‘Forget it. These people aren't faking. This is authentic. And I understand from the priest that this kind of thing has happened before. Apparently there's a statue of Christ in a church in Pennsylvania that bled from the hands in 1975.'

‘Who owns this latest model?' The fact that Fowler was here meant I was involved but I still couldn't see the connection.

‘A fifty-three-year-old woman called Marguerita Perez. She and her husband operate a small dry cleaning store in mid-Manhattan.'

That
was the connection. My stomach turned over. ‘When did this happen?'

‘Monday,' said Fowler. ‘According to Mrs Perez, it all started when this girl brought in an ankle-length brown woollen robe.'

‘What has this robe got to do with the statue?' I asked. As if I didn't know.

‘I'm coming to that,' said Fowler. ‘I gather there was nothing really special about the robe. Just an Arab-type thing. But different from the normal run of garments that get handed over the counter in that it was made from home-spun wool and woven on a hand loom.'

I shrugged. ‘So what? Ever since the Whole Earth Catalogue, hand-looms have been big business.'

‘Sure,' said Fowler. ‘But that's just a detail. The point is, when Mrs Perez gets hold of this robe, puts it in the steam press and stands on
the pedal, she finds herself standing on the hill at Golgotha, looking up at Jesus Christ nailed to the cross between the two thieves.'

I forced out a laugh. ‘With or without the steam press?'

Fowler grinned. ‘Well, I did say that it was kinda weird.'

I had to agree. Only there was now nothing to laugh at. It must have been Mrs Perez who followed Linda to the Mayflower Hotel. ‘Okay, then what?'

Fowler's grin broadened. ‘Production came to a halt. Mr Perez finds his wife standing in front of the steam press, staring into space, tears streaming down her cheeks, invoking Father, Son, Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mary, and very clearly in some kind of religious trance.'

‘Yeah, well, she wouldn't be the first.' I had decided to play it hard-nosed. Afraid that anything less might lead to the discovery of my guilty secret.

‘Anyway,' continued Fowler, ‘when he manages to snap her out of it, she tells him what she's seen, grabs hold of the robe and starts babbling that it belongs to Jesus Christ.'

Now why,
I asked myself,
did The Man have to pull a stroke like that? Or was he, the robe and everything else connected with him merely elements controlled by an even greater power?
‘What did Mr Perez do?' I said. ‘Call a doctor?'

‘No,' said Fowler. ‘He called Father Rosado. He's their parish priest. When he got there, Mrs Perez was saying her rosary in front of this statue. She has this little shrine set up on a big old chest, with candles and everything. And she'd got the robe folded up and placed on top of it, in front of this figure of Christ. So Father Rosado goes in to have a word with her and calm her down, and Mr Perez is hovering in the background, hoping the priest can persuade his wife to let go of the robe so that he can have it ready in case the customer calls. Mrs Perez grabs hold of Father Rosado and gives him an action replay of her vision-of-the-Cross and, as she begins swearing to God that every word of it is true, the statue starts to bleed.'

‘Now that
is
weird,' I said. And I meant it too. ‘The priest must have been pretty impressed.'

Fowler nodded. ‘So was Mr Perez. But I gather that the Vatican like to play this kind of thing fairly close to the chest. Miracles and saints are something they like to check out to the last detail. And then they sit on it for a hundred years before going to press.'

A policy I was not going to argue with.

‘What happened to the robe?' I asked.

‘Perez handed it over to the girl who brought it in. She collected it during the Tuesday lunch-hour. The ticket was made out in the name of Sheppard at the Mayflower Hotel. Perez says the girl told him the robe belonged to a friend.'

‘Does Perez know who she is?' I asked. Doing my best to convey the impression that the question was of only marginal academic interest.

‘He knows her by sight,' replied Fowler. ‘She brings in stuff now and then. But he can't remember her name. Anyway, when she called in to pick up the robe Mr Perez has to argue with his wife, but finally he gets it away from her and – '

‘And Mrs Perez follows the girl,' I said, trying to move things along.

‘Yes.' Fowler cocked his head on one side. ‘How did you know that?'

I smiled. ‘I always spoil movies for Miriam by telling her what's going to happen next. Okay, so the girl takes the robe to the Mayflower Hotel and delivers it to the person whose name is on the ticket.'

‘That a reasonable assumption,' said Fowler. ‘Mrs Perez didn't go into the hotel. She waited across the street. When the girl emerged about twenty minutes or so later, she didn't have it with her.'

‘I see …' Mrs Perez's version of the events squared with Linda's estimate of the time she'd spent with The Man. Not that, as far as I knew, she had any reason to tell me less than the truth. ‘What did Mrs Perez do then? Follow the girl?'

‘No,' said Fowler. ‘She just stood there. I know this sounds crazy, but she was convinced that Jesus Christ was going to appear.' Fowler raised his eyebrows clear of the tortoise-shell rims of his glasses and looked at me with an owl-like expression. As if trying to disassociate himself completely from the statement he had just made.

I sensed I was getting deeper into trouble but I had this insane desire to laugh. ‘And did he?'

‘Yes,' said Fowler. ‘Mrs Perez claims he walked out of the hotel, across the street and into Central Park.'

‘Do you believe her?' I asked.

‘I'm convinced she believes it,' said Fowler. ‘I
know
the statue is bleeding because I've seen that myself and my observations have been confirmed by three other people. I can't comment on her vision
of Golgotha but, clearly, they are all related events which, for the moment at least, cannot be explained in a rational, scientific manner. And that rather annoys me.'

‘Was she able to describe the person she saw?'

‘Oh, yes,' said Fowler. ‘Medium height, swarthy complexion, black beard, slim build, very piercing yellowy-brown eyes. He was dressed in this pale-brown robe that seems to have triggered this whole thing off, white Arab-type head-dress, bare feet, worn leather sandals.'

I nodded. ‘What time was this?'

‘About three o'clock in the afternoon.'

I picked up Fowler's glass, poured in the remaining Jack Daniels and handed it back to him. ‘What did she do – follow him into the Park?'

‘Yes.' He took the glass. ‘Thanks. The only time I get to drink this stuff is when somebody gives it to me as a Christmas present.'

‘Make it last,' I said. ‘That's the end of the bottle.' I refilled my own glass with bourbon and sat down. ‘Did she speak to him?'

‘No,' said Fowler. ‘But she claims he spoke to her.' He smiled. ‘As you can imagine, she was in a, well – highly emotional state. I mean, it's not every day you run into Jesus.'

Somehow, I managed to keep my face absolutely straight. ‘That's right.'

Fowler tapped the ash off his dwindling cheroot. ‘Her story is that she followed him until he sat down on a bench by the edge of the lake. Mrs Perez planted herself behind a tree about ten yards away.' Fowler grinned. ‘You can imagine it, can't you? There he is, just watching the people go by. Nobody gives him a second glance, but they all look at her like she's crazy.'

‘They could be right,' I observed.

‘Yes, sure, anyway,' said Fowler, ‘she stands there for about fifteen minutes and finally summons up the courage to go and sit on the other end of the park bench.'

‘And?'

Fowler shrugged. ‘She says Christ spoke to her. In Spanish.'

Of course. What else? ‘What did he say?' I asked.

Fowler swallowed hard. ‘He said, “
Hello, Marguerita. How are you today?”
But the poor bitch couldn't reply. She said her tongue was frozen to the roof of her mouth. So then he says, in Spanish again,
“
We don't have much time. Let me look at your hands.
” She was so scared she didn't dare move but she says that her arms kind of unfolded by themselves. And he took hold of her hands. She has these arthritic knuckle joints. Or rather, she had. Anyway, he kneads the backs of her hands with his thumbs and she feels this surge of power go all the way up to her shoulder-blades. Electricity was the way she described it. Then he put her hands one on top of the other, pats them and says, “
Have a nice day,
” and vanishes.'

I nodded soberly. ‘Just like that…'

‘Yes,' said Fowler. ‘Just like that.'