The Judas Child (41 page)

Paul Marie had felt a profound sense of loss when the publisher stopped coming to the prison. At the time, he had wondered—was it the man’s company he missed, or the challenge of slowly destroying the publisher by merely surviving, and then astonishing Bradly Kendall by actually thriving in this place. Years later, the priest had experienced genuine sorrow when he learned of the publisher’s death; he had come to understand the true nature of his own loss—the end of his most intense relationship with another human being. His old enemy was the only man he had ever mourned.

Now Paul Marie assessed the younger Kendall, whom he had once known as a choirboy. He sensed great damage in this man. And it was unsettling that Rouge was making his own measurements of the priest, sizing him up with calm hazel eyes as he sat down in one of the empty chairs on the other side of the table.

The second visitor remained with the guard by the door. This slender man had his back turned as he signed forms and took his own paperwork back from the guard. The cover sheet on the man’s clipboard carried the familiar crest of the FBI.

So it was to be business as usual. They would ask for his assistance in analyzing the new Monster of Makers Village. He settled back in his chair to await the inevitable questions of—

Now the FBI man was walking toward the table, eyes locked on the face of Paul Marie. Both men were equally shocked and disoriented as each looked into the mirror image of his own eyes.

Only Rouge Kendall seemed unfazed by this striking resemblance between the agent and the priest. Had the younger man set them up for this confrontation? Could Rouge be that convoluted? Oh, yes, certainly. His sister had been a very complex little human being, and they were twins, weren’t they?

But whenever Susan had come to him, her small deceits were harmless parts of the game they played together.

The FBI man with the familiar eyes was mute while Rouge was introducing him as Special Agent Arnie Pyle. The agent did not take the third chair at the table, but remained standing. Arnie Pyle had recovered some of his composure, but the shock remained with him. He was listing slightly to one side, as though he had just suffered an injury that threatened to bring him down at any moment.

When the FBI agent spoke, his voice was accusing, “What kind of contact did you have with Ali Cray?”

This was not the question Paul Marie had anticipated. “She came to see me a few days ago. She had questions on the murder of Susan Kendall.”

If Rouge found this information interesting, he gave no sign of it. The agent placed both hands flat on the table, perhaps for support. “Before that—
before
Susan Kendall died. Did you have a thing for Ali?”

And now Rouge Kendall did show some interest in the conversation, but it was fleeting.

“Ali was a little girl when I knew her,” said Paul Marie. “I’ve been here for—”

“Same question, you son of a bitch.” Agent Pyle pulled back. His face was reddening with anger. “Did you touch her?” He turned his back and walked off a few paces toward the door, only to turn and walk back to the table. Tremendous energy was building in this man, and he seemed to have no way to contain it. His next words had the force and velocity of gunfire. “You did it, didn’t you?” He shouted, “And Susan Kendall too! You creep, you miserable lowlife! Did you give Ali that scar? Were you the one?”

So this was a friend of Ali’s, a close friend, someone who loved her. “You believe she was attracted to you because of the resemblance to me? You’re probably right about that.”

Arnie Pyle flew across the table to put his hands around the priest’s neck. Paul Marie was quite capable of breaking this man’s back, even given the limited range of movement in his chains, but he did nothing to stop the assault. He only sat there, passive, while Rouge Kendall pried the agent’s hands away. Now Rouge and the guard stood on either side of the FBI man and pulled him back, struggling, feet dragging, toward the door at the other end of the room. Only Agent Pyle was facing him when Paul Marie said, “Maybe she went to you for comfort, for peace and shelter. Did she get it?”

The man seemed shocked anew, and he ceased to struggle. His mouth hung open, and his eyes gave away enormous pain. The two men released him. Pyle’s hands rose in a useless, helpless gesture. The guard was at the intercom; the door was opening.

The priest called out, “Agent Pyle? Ali is still in need of comfort.”

Pyle was pushed out of the room, and Rouge Kendall came strolling back to the table. So the young man had yet another question. The priest sat back, no longer confident of his ability to predict the day’s events. “What can I do for you?”

“My sister had a chain with a small oval of gold. The letters
AIMM
were engraved on it. I know she was in the habit of losing things during choir practice. My mother would like to have this little piece of jewelry back—it’s very important to her. Did you ever find anything like that? Maybe you saw it in the lost-and-found box?”

“No. The silver bracelet was the only thing of Susan’s that ever made it into the box. Usually, she’d come back after choir practice to tell me what she lost—always something tiny, hard to find. We’d search the cloakroom and the pews. Once I helped her hunt for a gold book-mark —small, thin as paper and very fine engraving. I remember it well. She said it was your birthday present to her when she was eight. Another time it was a little silver ring you gave her for Christmas. But then, everything she ever lost was something you had given her. This was her way of opening a conversation. Susan would thank me for helping her find it, and then she’d tell me why it was so important—because it came from you. You were always in her mind. That’s the way Susan put it.”

And now he had a reaction from Rouge, and he knew he had struck on some old memory that hurt him. Paul Marie continued, “I think talking about you eased the pain of the separation. But she had no experience with confiding in other people. This game was the only method she could devise. I never saw the necklace you described. I would’ve remembered it.”

“It wasn’t a necklace. It was an ankle chain.”

“Nothing like that either. Tell your mother I’m sorry I can’t help. I would if—”

“When did you find the silver bracelet?”

“A few hours after the last choir practice. I found it in the snow near the church steps.”

“Did you expect Susan to come back later and look for it?”

“That was the pattern. Though she always lost things
inside
the church. I thought she’d outgrow this habit eventually. Or maybe you’d come home from military school, and she wouldn’t need me anymore. When she didn’t return to church that night, I figured the bracelet belonged to one of the other children. So I put it in the lost-and-found box. Was this something that you gave her?”

“No, the bracelet was a present from my father.”

“Then it wouldn’t have been part of the game. She probably dropped it by accident.”

“It was never in your room? Oz Almo testified that—”

“He lied.”

Did Rouge believe that? There was nothing in the handsome young face to say what judgment he had arrived at. With no goodbye, his young visitor was rising to leave.

There was a rattle from the chains of the leg irons when the priest stood up—as any gracious host would do. The policeman was almost to the door when Paul Marie called out to him. “Rouge? The ankle chain was from you, wasn’t it?”

Rouge said nothing.

“The inscription you mentioned,
AIMM—always in my mind?”

There was the barest inclination of the young man’s head.

 

Rouge drove the car through the prison gates and turned onto the highway. For the next five miles of road, his passenger carried both sides of their conversation.

“Okay, I screwed up,” said Arnie Pyle. “Christ, you could’ve warned me. You gotta admit the connection was reasonable if Ali was seduced as a child. Sometimes the kids gravitate toward the abuser. It’s fear—a survival ploy. They want to stay on the bastard’s good side. You’re not buying any of this, are you?”

Rouge shrugged, eyes wandering to the side of the road, looking for the turnoff. He kept silent for another long stretch of highway and let the other man ramble on.

“So maybe Ali had a crush on the priest when she was a kid,” said Arnie Pyle. “That could explain it. What about your sister? Her too?”

“No, I don’t think so. My sister and I didn’t have any friends. We had each other. When I wasn’t there for her. she went to Paul Marie—for comfort.” And for confession? Susan could tell a priest how angry she was with their father over the separation, the loss of her twin. “Arnie, you should’ve been nicer to the priest. Maybe Ali told
him
how she got the scar.”

“Paul Marie could still be a pervert. That’s how some of these freaks work.” Pyle sat up a little straighter, suddenly reenergized. “Most pedophiles target emotionally vulnerable kids—they flatter them with attention. It’s a seduction—”

“The pervert we’re looking for doesn’t seduce kids, Arnie, he steals them. I think Ali’s right. The killer is just a sadistic bastard.”

“Paul Marie could still fit a pattern. What do you know about his early years? Any trouble with the law? If we can find a previous incident like flashing, a Peeping Tom complaint, something like that. The church is a damn magnet for child molesters.”

Rouge shook his head. “So are schools and summer camps. The priest is clean.”

They were approaching the exit sign for Makers Village. The curve of the side road swung them out of a tight closure of trees and into an open vista. Beyond the lake of sky-blue water were rolling hills marked with broad patches of evergreens and stripes of brown dead leaves from a march of trees whose season was done. A mist rolled over the water and softened the edges of every landmark on the far side.

Rouge stopped the car and pointed to the hazy shoreline. “A man named Oz Almo lives over there. He’s an ex-BCI investigator. His house is across the lake from the school and downshore a bit. I need to search that house, Arnie. You could get a warrant.”

“Me? Don’t count on it. I don’t have much clout on this case, not since Mrs. Green killed my ransom note with the purple underwear. Anyway, I thought the cops went through all the lake houses.”

“Oz Almo’s an ex-cop. He had rank with the State Police. Oz signed a consent form for a search, but it wouldn’t have been hard to sidetrack the troopers. And they were only looking for two little girls.”

“So what are
you
looking for, Rouge?”

“After Susan disappeared, my parents got a ransom demand. Oz Almo delivered the money himself. The rest of the force didn’t even know it was going down. He convinced my father he had a foolproof way to track the kidnapper. Afterwards, Oz said he lost the guy—gave Dad some story about faulty equipment.” Rouge pointed to the glove compartment. “In there. Something you might find interesting.”

Pyle opened the compartment and pulled out a sheaf of papers. When he had scanned them, he let out a low whistle. “Where did you get all this stuff? You’d have to rob a bank to get financial sheets like this.”

Rouge said nothing.

Arnie Pyle nodded his understanding. “I should have sources like yours. It’d save me a million miles of red tape.”

“See the wire transfers from out-of-state banks? There’s a blackmail pattern. That’s all you need for a warrant, right? It helps if you know Oz has a silent partner. Every one of those people used his cleaning lady, Rita Anderson.”

“As evidence goes, that’s pretty slim, kid. I can’t get a search warrant with ripped-off bank records and a cleaning lady.” Arnie was still poring over the financial history. “This ransom for your sister—how much money are we talking about?”

“Two million in large bills.”

“Jesus Christ.” Arnie flipped through the sheets. “I don’t see any sign of it. You must have missed something here. That kind of cash, even if he was spending it in small—”

“I don’t think he spent any of it. That’s why he needs the blackmail income. He knew the ransom was marked, and he knew my father had samples. That’s all Dad would tell him. He had a lot of faith in Oz, but he didn’t completely trust anybody.”

“But a cop would’ve known how the bills were marked when the police started a trace on the ransom money. That’s standard procedure.”

Rouge shook his head. “Oz wanted to do the money trace himself—quietly. He said it would ruin his life if the department found out about the botched ransom drop. When he asked for a sample of the marked bills, Dad refused. I think my father suspected Almo then. I was never sure. Dad might’ve hired someone to keep an eye on Almo and—”

“
Might have?
So far, you got a lot of supposition, kid, but damn few facts and zero evidence. If nobody knows how the ransom was marked—”

“I helped my father do it.” It had taken two days and a night. “The ransom note had a specific date. There wasn’t time for Dad to mark every bill by himself.”

“Rouge, this guy’s had fifteen years to examine the money. He’s checked for pinholes, dyes, every damn thing. Now that the currency has changed—”

“You’ll be looking for one dot to extend a line of engraving.” Rouge unfolded his wallet and pulled out a hundred-dollar bill with a red arrow pointing to the alteration. “Printer’s ink—almost a perfect match. We used fine-point Rapidographs. You keep that sample, Arnie. I wouldn’t like to be accused of planting evidence.”

“Rouge, this guy’s an ex-cop. He knows the odds of a marked bill being found, even when it’s altered in an obvious way. If he couldn’t find your dad’s mark, he wouldn’t worry about some bank teller picking up on it.” Arnie folded the financial sheets, returned them to the glove compartment and shut the door, as if to say that this matter was closed. He looked down at the hundred dollars in his hand. “Large bills like this one increase the risk, but after all this time, I think you can kiss the evidence goodbye.” He held the bill out between them.