The Sculptor

Cathy awoke from her nap disoriented. It was as if time had suddenly leaped forward, and she could not be sure how long the FBI agent had been gone.

“What did you find?”

“Quite a lot. But who knows if any of it is going to help us. Best thing to do now is to get back to the computer—or better yet, get to the library before it closes.”

“Why?”

“Well,” Markham began, driving off, “first thing I found out is that Shirley Manzera’s late husband is the connection to St. Bart’s—the Gambardelli Pieta was donated in memory of his mother. Mr. Manzera’s family was originally from the Silver Lake area of Providence, where St. Bart’s is located. I don’t know the details, but Shirley Manzera said her husband used to own some kind of construction business. Don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that he made quite a killing back in the 1950s, and moved his whole family out of Providence and into upscale East Greenwich. I didn’t want to ask how Mrs. Manzera met her husband, but she was adamant about wanting nothing to do with the Catholic Church—particularly St. Bart’s and her ‘husband’s old neighborhood,’ as she put it. She’s a bit of a snob, quite frankly.”

“How did her husband die?”

“Not what you think. I saw some pictures of him on the mantle and asked. Emphysema, the old woman told me. Four years ago.”

“I see.”

“But hang on. The Manzeras had four children—three daughters and a son named Damon. Damon was the youngest, and judging from the family photos, probably about a ten- to twelve-year spread between him and his oldest sister. All the daughters are married.”

“Wait. You said Damon was the youngest? Did something happen?”

“I couldn’t ask, Cathy. Couldn’t pry because of the reason I was there—the stolen art ring. But, did you see the swimming pool, the tennis court out back?”

“Yes.”

“Again, I don’t know the exact details—but Mrs. Manzera told me that her son Damon drowned in that swimming pool ten years ago.”

“And you think his death is somehow connected to The Michelangelo Killer?”

“I don’t know, Cathy. But we should look for something in the newspapers first—an article about the drowning, the young man’s obituary. If anything seems out of whack, I can get Sullivan on the police and coroner’s reports for Damon Manzera next. I may be totally barking up the wrong tree. It may all be just a bizarre coincidence—”

“You don’t really think that, do you, Sam?”

The FBI agent gave only a weak shrug of his shoulders as the black Trailblazer emerged from the leafy canopy that was the Manzeras’ neighborhood. The silence was long and awkward, but by the time Markham reached Route 95 they were talking again—trading theories as to what to do in the event of a dead end.

Neither one of them noticed the blue Toyota Camry that had entered onto the highway a short distance behind them.

Chapter 43

The Sculptor was careful not to get too close—made sure he left at least six or seven car lengths between him and the FBI vehicle. He had taken a gamble driving back to his house in order to exchange the Porsche for the Camry—did not want to be too conspicuous in case whoever was inside the black Trailblazer spotted him as they exited the neighborhood and made for the highway. It was a gamble that paid off. And now that The Sculptor was onto them, he did not want to ruin this golden opportunity to find out exactly what the FBI was up to—did not want to throw away the stellar hand that fate had finally dealt him.

The Sculptor had spent that Saturday morning in disguise—a moustache, glasses, and a baseball cap—driving around aimlessly in his Porsche, searching for a sign—of Dr. Hildy, maybe, or perhaps where he might later go shopping for some material for his David. And although he had found neither and was about to return home frustrated, just like the day when he unexpectedly spied his satyr walking home from the Cranston Pool, The Sculptor understood that fate had also directed him to drive by the Manzeras’ house just in time.

Yes, perhaps more than anything The Sculptor understood the delicate workings of fate—understood how to recognize the signs of divine providence and negotiate that razor-thin line between predestination and free will. Such insight, such sensitivity was a gift that had been bestowed upon him as a boy—when he was still called Christian—when he first laid eyes upon the Pieta in St. Bartholomew’s, the church of his mother.

It was there, back in her old neighborhood, that she used to take him on Sundays when his father was away on business. And it was there, in the small chapel off of the main church, that the boy named Christian would often stand for what seemed like hours staring at the marble statue of the Virgin and Her Son.

“A mother’s love is the greatest gift a boy can have,” Christian’s mother would often tell him. “It’s why I named you Christian.”

“And your name is Mary,” the little boy would reply. “Just like in the statue.”

“That’s right,” said his mother. “And I love you more than anything in the whole wide world. Just like in the statue.”

Oh yes. Even as a boy The Sculptor understood.

And for years on those Sundays at St. Bartholomew’s it was only just the two of them—Mary and Christian, mother and son—listening to Father Bonetti read the Mass, and then lingering in the votive chapel to stare at the marble statues long afterward. Mother and son always agreed: the Pieta was their favorite.

But when the boy named Christian grew a little older—oh, six or seven The Sculptor supposed—his mother began to rest her hand in his groin when she drove him home from the bakery after church—the smell of fresh Italian bread filling the car as his Sunday khakis grew tight beneath the warmth of her hand. It was a strange sensation, the boy named Christian thought, but one that was pleasing to him nonetheless. What was even better was when she would sit next to him that way on the sofa. She would let him stay up late on Fridays to watch Victoria Principal—that woman on Dallas who was so pretty, and who the boy named Christian thought looked just like his mother. On one such Friday, when the boy named Christian asked his mother why she did not sit with him that way when his father was home, his mother explained that it was a secret: a special secret from God that was to be kept only between mother and son; a secret that if anyone else knew, not only would the boy’s father kill himself, but God would kill her—would turn her into a statue just like Mary in the church.

And so the boy named Christian never understood why, all of a sudden one day when he was nine, mother and son stopped going to church. But it wasn’t too long afterward that the beatings began, and later, worst of all, the cold baths. Even though he did not like the beatings, the boy named Christian always understood why his mother knocked him on the head; he always understood why she slapped him then locked him in the bathroom with the spilled bleach. That only happened when he was bad—like the time he drank some of her wine, or the time he tore out some pictures from her old college history books.

But always—when he was super naughty as his mother used to call it—when the boy named Christian went down face first into the tub of icy water, he had no idea what he had done to set his mother off. The cold baths came only once every month or so; they were always late at night when his mother had been drinking. “Out!” she would say, bursting into his bedroom—her breath foul with the smell of wine and cigarettes as she yanked him by the hair into the bathroom. The baths were always the same, but the boy named Christian never got used to them. He was sure that every time he went under that this time would be the last; he was sure that, as he began to choke, as she pushed him under once more he would never see his beloved father again.

But always, just as he felt that icy tingle down in his chest, his mother would pull him out of the tub. And later, as he lay shivering naked in his bed in the dark, she would crawl under the covers with him—one hand