Prayer (23 page)

As I parked my car near the main university building, I regarded the temple top of the university tower with forensic interest, trying to calculate with a marksman’s eye an approximate height and distance; and for a moment, I came to a halt with my gaze fixed on the tower clock, imagining what it must have been like to have been standing exactly where I was on August 1, 1966. I think everyone visiting the university probably does the same thing. We do it for the same reason that makes us all instinctively glance above when we drive up Dealey Plaza past the Texas School Book Depository in Dallas. It is human to be fascinated by such things. To have been in the cross-hairs of some madman’s high-powered rifle sight—what does that feel like? It’s an act of prurient imagination that feeds our appetite for contemplating the arbitrary impermanence of human life, not to mention the unspeakable human brutality that sometimes occasions it. No doubt the people up on the tower’s observation deck were imagining much the same thing as I was. We were all traveling back in time to when Charles Whitman had barricaded the tower’s observation deck; and then, with two rifles and a shotgun, had shot and killed fifteen people.

Compared to the criminal investigation that had prompted me to drive one hundred and sixty miles from Houston, Whitman’s crime seemed all too real and I briefly reproached myself for the frivolity of my present inquiry. Surely Gisela was right; I had to be obsessed with proving religious believers were criminals if I’d driven all the way to Austin to chase a goose as wild as this one. Maybe I did need help. But then I remembered the sight of a broken Gaynor Allitt fallen from a similarly tall building and carried on with my fool’s errand. But it can be a mistake to underestimate the tenacity of a really determined fool.

Or for that matter, the tenacity of a really bad architect. In the main university building they directed me a short way north of the sniper tower to the Norman Hackerman Building on East Twenty-fourth Street. This was a very modern building, but in a way that reminded me so strongly of an architect’s maquette that I half expected to see it surrounded by scale-model trees made of foam rubber and some Lego people.

They were expecting me at the reception desk; a security tag was already completed in my name, and as soon as I had flashed my ID—this caused much excitement—I was permitted through the turnstile and then into an elevator.

Before I Googled her on my laptop in the car, I’d had an idea that Dr. Sara Espinosa would be Latin American, but from her extensive Wikipedia page, it was obvious that she was anything but that. Originally from Hartford, Connecticut, she’d attended Yale and then won a prestigious UNESCO L’Oréal International Fellowship grant for her work in microbiology and virology; but it was as a debater on scientific and political issues that she was best known. She was a regular on Fox News because she was a frequent and popular target of the American right for her views on the three A’s: atheism, abortion, and Afghanistan.

In person, she was taller than I expected, with strawberry-blond hair, a wide mouth, a wry, mocking smile, and a deep, sexy voice; her hands were mannish and her manner brisk, as if she was used to dealing with people less intelligent than she was, which was probably everyone. She was very attractive and not much like the lab-rat women I’d known back at Boston College. She wore black linen trousers, a black linen shirt, and a white cotton jacket that may or may not have been a lab coat.

“Agent Martins, I presume,” she said loudly, greeting me at the elevator door. “Only someone from the FBI would wear a woolen jacket in this place and in this weather. I presume that’s because you’re carrying a firearm. Do you always carry a weapon, Agent Martins?”

A lot of her conversation was like that—as if she knew the answer already or couldn’t be bothered to await an answer.

“Yes. It saves getting shot.”

She laughed and led me into an expensively furnished office with a wraparound sofa, several desktop PCs, and a wide-screen TV. We sat down. On the wall above her head was a large picture of Charles Darwin—just in case anyone should be in any doubt as to where her sympathies lay.

“Could I see it?”

“Hmm?”

“Your gun. Could I see it, please? I’ve never seen a real gun up close and yet so many people seem to carry them in Texas. So, I’m curious to know what all the fuss is about. Especially at this university. Lots of people carry guns at UT. Even some of the students. For obvious historical reasons.”

“Sure,” I said. “If you want.”

I reached around to the small of my back, fetched the Glock from my holster, and ejected the double magazine before handing it to her. She watched with fascination.

“There you go, Dr. Espinosa.” I started my spiel. “Thanks for seeing me, I’m sure you must be very busy—”

“And do you do that—I mean, take the bullets out of the handle like that—because you actually fear I might shoot you?”

“If you did, I very much doubt it would be on purpose.”

“Since we’ve only just met.”

“That certainly didn’t stop Charles Whitman,” I said.

“The poor boy was suffering from a massive brain tumor when he shot all those people. Did you know that?”

“But accidents do happen. Especially with firearms.”

“If what one reads is correct, fifteen hundred Americans a year are killed by accidental firearm discharges. Although that’s actually quite small when you take into account that every year thirty thousand Americans die from gunshot wounds. You would think it would be more, wouldn’t you? I mean, you can’t imagine that there were thirty thousand people shot and killed because another thirty thousand people actually wanted that to happen.”

“I can imagine it,” I said. “Only too well, I’m afraid.”

“Perhaps you can, at that.” She weighed the gun in her hand, like she was judging a melon. “How does it make you feel, Agent Martins? When you’re carrying it? What I mean is, do you think it has a psychological effect on the way you conduct yourself?”

“You ask some very personal questions, Dr. Espinosa.”

“Yes, I do.”

“Well, to be honest, I’m glad I haven’t had to use it. I have a colleague who shot two people and I think it bothers her a lot.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” She smiled. “By the way, call me Sara. Or Doctor, if you must. My real name is Sara Hooker, but for obvious reasons I prefer to use Espinosa. You’ve no idea how puerile student minds can be. As it happens, Hooker is actually a very scientific name. There was a Joseph Hooker who’s a distant ancestor of mine who was actually Charles Darwin’s closest friend. But that’s another story. Luis Espinosa was the name of my third husband. He’s from Argentina and I married him because he looked so becoming on a polo pony. I kept his name because when I first appeared in print and on television that’s what I was calling myself; back then I still had the romantic notion that we might be together forever. He left me when I stopped paying his debts. In retrospect, I would rather like to have shot him dead, the bastard. I’ve never met a lazier, more good-for-nothing man in my life than my ex-husband, Luis. And believe me I know what I’m talking about. I have two other ex-husbands to compare him with. Does that shock you, Agent Martins?”

“Not really. Nothing shocks me all that much. Not anymore.”

“You have my sympathy. To be shocked by things is one way of gauging how civilized we are. Don’t you think so?” She sighed extravagantly. “Well, there it is. Now you know all about me. It’ll save you from having to slap me around later.” She smiled, handed me back my gun, and watched carefully as I reloaded it, as if seeking instruction. “How many does that thing hold?”

“The magazine? Nineteen nine-millimeter rounds. It’s quite a conversation stopper.”

“Nineteen rounds. That seems a lot. At least until someone starts shooting at you, I suppose. Then you would want as many rounds as humanly possible, I imagine.”

“I could show you how to use it if you like.”

Her face brightened. “Would you?”

“Is there a reason you’d like to learn how to use a gun?”

“Not really. Only I think I might be rather good at it. My father was an excellent shot and I take after him in nearly everything else. He was a professor of medicine.”

“My father used to be a professor of orthopedic surgery at Tufts Medical Center.”

“Oh, my word. I wonder if they ever knew each other. My dad was at Yale medical school. Isn’t it a small world?”

“Why didn’t your father teach you how to shoot?”

She sighed. “He shot himself. After that, my mother never allowed us anywhere near guns. She wouldn’t allow one in the house.”

“I’m sorry.”

She smiled nervously, as if she had been just on the edge of shedding a tear. “I don’t know why I’m telling you these things.”

“I’m from the FBI. And it’ll save me from having to slap it out of you later.”

The smile widened. “Oh, I’m so glad that you have a sense of humor, Agent Martins. One always imagines that federal agents are rather straight, ugly men with bad suits and even worse haircuts. You’re none of those things. Tell me, are there many women who work for the FBI?”

“Plenty. My own boss is a woman.”

“And how do you like that?”

I shrugged. “I like it fine. Most of the time I don’t pay it much regard.”

“As a rule, men hate working for a woman. It makes them feel inadequate. It’s the same dynamic that ruins a lot of marriages. Women should always pretend to be dumber than their husbands, especially when they’re not.”

“Actually, I think I’ve learned a lot from my boss. And from that colleague I was telling you about. The one who shot two subs.”

“What would you say you’ve learned from your female colleagues?”

“For one thing, I’ve learned something about women.” I grinned. “Speaking as a man, you can never know too much on that particular subject.”

“True. Most men are fearfully ignorant about women. Especially the women they’re married to.”

“I know I was.”

“Divorced?”

“Not quite. But I will be soon. First time.”

“Oh dear. What were you ignorant of? If you don’t mind my asking.”

“We were regular churchgoers and I fell by the wayside. I stopped believing in God and she didn’t. So she threw me out. Simple as that.”

Of course, it wasn’t, not really, but it made for a neat shorthand.

Sara’s jaw dropped. “With apologies to Ford Madox Ford, that’s the saddest story I ever heard. Hasn’t she heard of love thy neighbor?”

“Since I no longer choose to stand in church beside her, Ruth finds it very hard to think of me as her neighbor at all. I’m more of a kind of tourist from a pagan country who’s outstayed his welcome.” I shook my head. “I don’t know why I’m telling
you
this.”

“Because we’re having a conversation. Because I asked. Because you already showed me your gun. Because you volunteered to teach me how to shoot. Because you feel you can confide in me. Which must mean there’s chemistry of the kind neither of us understands. Well, at least you don’t. That’s why.”

“What kind of chemistry?”

“The biochemical kind. Olfactory receptors. Human beings have four hundred functional genes coded for olfactory receptors and six hundred that we believe are pseudogenes, which means they’ve lost their protein-coding ability. However, I tend to believe that they’re not disabled for everyone; indeed, that some of those pseudogenes are, in fact, fully functioning for many people. Smell is a lot more important in the way we get on with some people and not with others than we might think.”

“So now I know why girls fall helplessly in love with me. They’re just following their noses.”

She smiled triumphantly. “Exactly so. While you’re teaching me to shoot, I can teach you some human biology.”

“I asked you before if there was a reason why you’d like to learn how to shoot and you told me a lie.”

Momentarily, she looked delighted. “How did you know that?”

“You might say my nose told me. You see, Sara, people lie to me all the time.”

“Yes, I suppose they must. Or they’d be arrested. Or shot.”

“So the reason is . . . ?”

“Well, yes. You’re right, Agent Martins.”

“Call me Gil. Most people do.”

“That’s a relief. There is a reason, Gil. Because of who and what I am, or more likely because of what I say—because of all that, there are plenty of people who hate my guts. And who would certainly like to see me dead. There’s no real free speech in this country. Not anymore. Certainly not for anyone who speaks her mind on television as I do. Consequently, I’m in constant receipt of death threats. Which is why I employ a mail screening service to examine all my snail mail, and why I run ChoiceMail on my personal computer. That’s a permission-based e-mail program that assumes everything is spam unless you tell it otherwise—only approved e-mail gets into your in-box. And it’s also why my home is monitored by Smith Protective Services. They’re the largest in Texas, and I pay for a full service that gives me access control, video surveillance, burglar alarms, and an armed guard response. At least that’s what it says on my quarterly invoice. But lately I’ve been thinking of downgrading to something more manageable. My own personal firearm might be just the answer.”

“Smith is the best,” I said. “You couldn’t do better. So can I ask why you’re thinking of downgrading your personal security at this present moment in time?”

“Smith is the best, yes. But it’s also expensive. Also, I don’t feel I’m getting as many death threats as perhaps I used to. I must be slipping.”

“Or maybe ChoiceMail and the USPS are doing a better job than you think.”

“Good point. I never thought of that.”

“So there’s nothing new on that front that you’ve become aware of lately? New threats. Hate mail. That kind of stuff.”

“There’s nothing new,” she said carefully, “but I can’t imagine that you drove all the way down from Houston for the hell of it.”

“No,” I said. “It’s because your name has appeared on a list of names of people identified as enemies of the church and God. Some of those names have received threats. I’m just checking the others on that list to see if they’ve been threatened, too. That’s all. Nothing more serious than that, Sara. So, given what you’ve just told me, I think you can relax.”