The 37th mandala : a novel (33 page)

He couldn't see the screen from where he stood, and the sound wasn't up very loud. He worked his way around the counter past the slush machines and the magazine rack, until he could see the screen. A fuzzy, blurry video image, attributable not to poor camerawork but to lousy reception. A scrubby vacant lot with candles and broken glass and a body covered with a bloody sheet; and on the brick wall above, a large dark circular pattern that made his pulse quicken—then the picture was gone. Fucking media tidbits—never a fully developed thought, or even an image. Everything was subliminal these days. Was it a mandala, or wasn't it? He couldn't hear the talking head, and could barely read his title of "Occult Crime Expert." Then came another picture, painted in wavering, washed-out video tones. He almost dropped his coffee. As the image wavered in and out, he recognized their house. Tucker's house. A woman in a bright red coat stood in the driveway, next to Lenore's Cutlass, holding a microphone.

"No," he whispered. The man looked over at him, and Michael snatched up a copy of
Guns and Ammo
.

"I'll take this too," he said, holding it up. The man looked suspiciously at him now, as if he were waving an actual gun. As he rang up the sale, he blocked Michael's view of the TV. Michael gave him the money, trying for another clear shot of the screen. But the story was over, and now there was nothing on but advertisements. He looked down at the rack, but there was nothing on the cover of any newspapers he could see, nothing about occult murders.

He rushed out with his purchases, trying to see if the North Carolina plates were visible from the market. He hooked the pump back into the machine, dripping gasoline over his shoes, twisting the cap into place with his other hand. He drove away in a panic, nearly taking the wrong off ramp, which would have carried them east again.

Are they looking for us now? he wondered. Could they possibly know we've gotten this far? Do they have a description of our car? Wouldn't every highway patrolman who's passed us, all the way across the country, remember this Beetle in an instant?

Are we suspects?

How could we not be?

Michael's temple room, directly under the murder scene, was full of ceremonial knives, everything the North Carolina cops knew a black magician needed for his sacrificial killings. And on his altar, Jesus, Derek Crowe's Mandala Rites lay open wide, probably to the very mandala that was splattered on Tucker's wall.

Should he ditch the car somewhere out here in the desert? Find a dirt road and drive it over the edge of some ravine? They could hitchhike into the next town, catch a Greyhound going to San Francisco. But how long would all that take? Maybe he could get some spray-paint, paint the car black.

Ridiculous.

The only thing to do was to get to San Francisco as swiftly as possible and hope the cops were still treating this as a local thing, checking North Carolina and the immediate states. People got away with murder all the time—actual murderers. They turned up weeks or months or years later, far from the crime scenes, having lived anonymously and without being recognized until their story was featured on
Unsolved Mysteries
or
America's Most Wanted
.

That's us, he thought. We'll be on both shows. Our faces will be everywhere eventually.

But in the meantime, they had a chance to get to San Francisco. Certainly the mandalas would be doing their part to keep the way open, keep the cops off their backs.

The main thing was to get to Derek Crowe. To get help for Lenore from the one man who might understand her condition. Once she had been cared for, then they could worry about the law—figure out whether to run or turn themselves in with some story that sounded less than utterly insane.

The car whined as it climbed toward the sinister serrations of a coal-black range. He decided to tell Lenore nothing. Headlights appeared behind him, pulling out of the sun; approaching quickly, then passing in a rush that rocked the car. It was a trooper, bent on other business. He could hardly have passed the Beetle without recognizing it, if he was looking for such an unlikely vehicle. But the taillights turned to tiny beads and vanished up ahead.

It didn't help. He couldn't relax. They still had the length of the state to travel. Anything could happen.

In us all is shattered and twisted. And never forget that we hold you in our jaws.

—from
The Mandala Rites
of Elias Mooney

In us all is rapture and bliss. And never forget that we hold you in our hearts.

—from
The Mandala Rites
of Derek Crowe

The first time the buzzer rang, Derek ignored it. He had just switched on the ten o'clock news and was expecting no visitors. Bums on the street were always pressing buttons just to irritate those with homes. Usually they didn't bother any one apartment more than a time or two.

This time, however, the buzzer persisted. The only possible unannounced visitor he could think of was Lilith. He jumped up and pressed the intercom switch in the hall.

"Who's there?" he said.

He heard nothing but traffic.

Once more: "Who is it?"

This time a voice, blurred and unintelligible. Some drunk or crackhead. If he started insulting them over the intercom, they might well come back to the buzzer all night. He knew of people who'd been killed for smaller offenses.

He went back to the sofa, but the buzzer sounded before he could sit. Now it rang continuously.

He stormed down the hall and out the door, convinced that by the time he got to the street the pesterer would be long gone. He rushed down two flights of spiraling stairs to the lobby, followed by the buzzing from his apartment. Reaching the glass doors, he saw two shapes silhouetted in the entryway, one of them fingering the button. He threw open the inner door, but not the cage that kept them out. "What do you want?"

Michael Renzler stepped back into streetlight, translated from shadows.

"Jesus ..." Derek clung to the door, only shock preventing him from slamming it in their faces. They looked as if they'd hitchhiked all the way from North Carolina; exhaustion had carved the flesh from the boy's already bony face. His wife's eyes were sleepy and seductive, looking him up and down. She gave him a soft, worn-out smile. He twisted the latch on the iron gate and let her in—she drew Michael with her.

"What are you doing here?"

"You got my card?" Michael said in a low voice as he passed Derek. They trudged up the stairs as invited. Derek fell in behind them. "I didn't have your number, uh, so we had to just come. When I wrote it I didn't really have any idea how bad it could get."

"Your card? What are you talking about?"

"You didn't get it? Well... I didn't have much room to write anyway. We'd still have to explain everything."

"Do you mean you—you flew out here just to see me?"

"Flew?" Michael said. "No, man. We drove."

"My God, that fast?"

"I don't know for sure what day it is. I haven't had much sleep since we saw you."

"Well... here's my apartment. Door's open."

Lenore stopped at the threshold, and he looked her over as he beckoned her in. Her hair was greasy, falling over her smudged face and forehead, into her eyes. She pushed it back with grimy fingers, and he saw with dismay the mandala reproduced on her forehead. He didn't say anything, hoped his face hadn't betrayed him, but his thought was: Oh, God, another fanatic.

Could her life really have been so empty that she'd embraced the mandala cult after one hour's mediocre lecture?

"Why don't you come in?" he said, since she seemed to be waiting for an invitation. She smiled back at Michael, then went inside.

Derek locked the door after them. Michael surveyed the living room with plain disappointment, as if he had expected to find a museum of occult artifacts, tribal masks, ancient ritual implements. There were no visible clues to Derek's occupation.

Lenore's eyes drifted about, finally coming to rest on Elias's box, which had been sitting out near the sofa; he'd been unable to bring himself to haul it away, to make a decision about the thing one way or the other.

"Let me clear some room," he said hastily, stooping for the box. He carried it into the bedroom and shoved it back into the closet, feeling vaguely embarrassed. He came back to find Lenore stretched out on the sofa watching TV, her eyes borrowing vigor from the reflected glare of advertisements.

"Can I get you something to drink?"

No answer from Lenore. Michael followed him into the kitchen.

"I know this is really unexpected," Michael said, "I mean, really unforgivable. I wouldn't have done it if things hadn't gotten so serious. I was pretty scared, on my own. It seemed like you're the only person who can help us, the only one who knows what's going on. And Lenore
really
wanted to come."

"She did? But why?"

"It was the
Rites
, " Michael said. "The night we met you. We did a ritual and ... and they came through. Through Lenore, I mean. They didn't talk through her, not at first—except she recited parts of the keys she couldn't have known. But we had a very intense ceremony, and they sort of got in and got out of control. Then Lenore started getting weird. She must have some sort of natural, you know, psychic talent. She's been channeling them. Speaking their language, seeing things I can't explain,
doing
things ... well, I've seen some pretty strange stuff in the last few days myself."

"Have you?" Derek said. It didn't surprise him that the boy was delirious; but was it true that Lenore too was cracking up? Or was the kid projecting his own occult fantasies on his wife, using her as a way of getting closer to Crowe? Queasily, Derek wondered if Michael were using his wife as some sort of offering to him.

"What did you want me to do?" he asked.

"Well, you're the mandala master. There's nothing in the
Rites
about this."

Derek found himself checking to make sure Lenore couldn't hear them. The TV held her hypnotized. He kicked out the plastic wedge that kept the door from swinging shut and went to the refrigerator to busy himself with milk and coffee, anything to give himself time.

I have attracted not one but
two
lunatics, he thought. I did this to myself, by pretending to be an authority on something that does not even exist except in the minds of the mentally ill (including Elias Mooney and Etienne and all the rest—even down to that stone-age tribe in Cambodia). And now he expects me to enter his madness on a rescue mission. By accepting his story, and acting on it, he supposes that I will verify the complete reality of his delusions.

I can't have these people in my house, he thought.

"I don't know quite how to approach this," Derek said after a few moments, choosing his words carefully. Preparing coffee was a ritual, and he took his time about it, setting up the filter, grinding the beans, measuring scoops into the cone. "I thought I was clear in the
Rites
that the mandalas don't come at my beck and call. In fact, they didn't really come to me at all. They came to—well, Ms. A. I just happened to be there. Neither of us could summon them unless they felt like coming; and once they'd said what they'd come to say, they went away, and that was that. Basically, Michael, everything I know about them is in my book. If we were going to find out anything else—I mean, some way of dealing with your wife's condition—we'd have to get them back again, wouldn't we? And there's no reason to think they'd come. It's not like Ms. A and I haven't tried calling them back to tie up some of the loose ends. In fact, my publisher recently begged for a sequel, more of the mandalas' philosophy, but I doubt they'll ever oblige us."

Michael began to gnaw on his thumb as the gravity of Derek's disclaimers began to make clear the futility of his cross-country trip. "But ... but, Mr. Crowe, they
are
here. Lenore's channeling them now. You can—you can ask her."

"And you think they'd tell us how to banish them? Why would they do that?"

He heard the door creak. Lenore stood in the entry. "Michael, can we go to bed soon?"

"Lenore, we've got—" Michael turned desperately to Derek. "I'm sorry, Mr. Crowe, we've just totally barged in on you. We've got to find a place to stay. We're completely wiped. Even if you can help us, it's not going to happen tonight. I saw a motel just up the street; we'll see if they've got rooms and ... and maybe we can talk to you tomorrow, when we've had some rest."

Lenore looked disappointed; her eyes fixed on Derek, and he found himself saying "Look, why don't you two stay here for the night?"

"What? Seriously?"

"That's a sofa bed in there. I've got extra blankets. You just—you've come all this way to see me, I'm not going to send you out so soon. Tomorrow I'll take you somewhere you might be able to meet people who can help you. Friends of mine, whose advice I'd trust. As I say, I really can't tell you more about the mandalas than I've already written—but maybe that's not the only possible solution."

"Wow," Michael said. "That's incredibly kind of you."