oommmmmm that never stopped, no more than the trickling water sounds could be stopped. Lately, the walls reverberated with the three words Mihi beata mater, Mihi beata mater, Mihi beata mater…
The walls bled water that seeped in from the streets of London above the ancient, Roman-built catacombs where they met in secret ceremony. The walls became slick and mirror like in their wetness, the evening rains above finding them. The ancient walls told stories, spoke of Roman conquest, of debauchery and defilement, of a time when Christians had been slaughtered here, further making this place sacrosanct. The walls might as well run with blood as with God's tears, their leader had more than once declared.
“Why are we beseeched so? Why are we tested so? Why, Oh Precious One? Why do You make me blind that I will not know, but must accept all Holy Writ on faith and faith alone?” he preached aloud to those who followed him, in the makeshift chapel, where an ancient altar of thick, coarse oak, and an equally ancient cross of the same wood, stood as sturdy props-the only holy props aside from the torches and the branding fire that awaited use again. “Why are we tested so?” he repeated, his words like thunder.
“Offer us hope!” cried out one among the congregation.
Their leader looked out on his small following, which was dwindling with each new meeting. There appeared less than forty who would step over into the true millennium with him and the newfound Christ.
“Send Thy divine message through this wretched vessel, so that others might also accept Your grace and reckoning,” he continued. “Be not dismayed at our weaknesses, our failings, and give us Thy strength. If not in numbers then give it to us in power-the divine power that is You, Lord Jehovah.” He slavered at the mouth with his pronouncement.
The others wore the robes of monks-robes he had secured for them-their faces covered in hoods like cowls, and each looked up in solemn wonder at the depth of their leader's passion, his compassion and his faith. Each thought: He must know. He must indeed have the ear of God as no man else.
It made perfect sense, even if on the surface of it they did appear to have failed three times in their attempts at the resurrection of a life, a life which the Son would inveigh with His very own divine presence in the Second Coming, to mark the second millennium-the true millennium. Their leader, a man of worldly knowledge and otherworldly passion, of outward and inward beauty, had said so. He had explained it entirely and utterly to their satisfaction, more than once.
The message went forth clear and concise, a kind of soliloquy in which their humble leader lamented again his choice for the Messiah. “As spiritual father of the collective, believing in all that we do and have done in the name of the Father, I cannot now unbelieve anymore than I can undo the steps we have taken. I accept the wisdom of the Son and the Holy Ghost, believing in all that we have put our blessed trust into… In Your name, Lord Jehovah, we beseech Thee to guide our darkened path.”
“It is dark indeed!” cried out one of the many.
“Show us the way!” pleaded another from behind closed eyelids.
Their leader had, after Coibby, turned to the well-to-do, bom-again radio personality, Theodore 'Ted” Burton. He had believed beyond any doubt that the man was the Messiah walking… The Messiah, walking the Earth incognito, begging to be brought out into the light of recognition for all to see. For a time, Burton had looked like, felt like, sounded like, smelled like, and appeared to be God's Son-the Jew who had renounced Judaism in the name of Christ the Lord.
“Who better than a Jew to become Jesus, who was, after all, a Jew?” he'd instructed them back then.
“We all did love Burton for the part,” he reminded his congregation now. “For his having renounced Judaism and his embracing the true church. But in the end. Burton proved an even greater disappointment than the two previous sacrifices. What say you, my followers? Is it not time to select a new Messiah?”
He looked out over his diminished flock, and it-they- seemed to be disappearing, vanishing before his eyes. One here, one there… They appeared defeated, tired, shriveled, atrophied as a group. They looked old, worn, frustrated, yet wanting guidance and reassurances. A fleeting thought beamed through the electrochemical network of his brain: He wondered if he were not they, and if they were not he, all in all, one in the same? Mannequins in a mindless world of chance and hallucination, smoke and mirrors, none of it real, none of it under the control of any universal power, more chaotic than Alice's Wonderland. But even as the thought formed in his head, he banished it with a more pious and self-recriminating one: How dare I exhault myself above the others, to stand here at this altar over their heads while they keep dropping off? Dying from view. I can't walk among them anymore, can't truly touch them ever again, so separate have I become. I, too, have vanished, and I, too, am weary of this tired world, but I have been called on, and I must heed His call to find the fourth Messiah.
Then it occurred to him: as a sea washes a lovely starfish to one's feet, so the idea came floating from an unseen hand. And it fit. It made perfect sense that God's Son would be a matrix of human qualities, that no single human posssessed them all. That in crucifying the others they had in fact created a kind of bank, a holding place, for all of the virtues Christ must have for the Second Coming.
Now he must determine when, where, and how to best explain this new revelation to his followers. The simple poetic vision, the simplicity of the truth alone, must be seen by the others as Divine Intervention. He raised the blood of Christ to his lips and drank a toast to the beauty of it all, the perfect syncopation of a plan that he'd taken on blind faith but was now coming into full-blown focus.
The York proved absolutely gorgeous, a fabulous place to stay, and the plush bed that Jessica slept in had allowed for a good night's rest. Dining in the breakfast nook overlooking the Victoria Gardens proved so relaxing that she almost forgot why she had come to London. She cursed the fact that she did not have time to see the sights, to breathe in the history and romance of this ancient city. Her limited time here would be wrapped up with the dark underbelly of London and the bleakness of forensic work, the evil at hand, the evil destroying the peace, an evil staining all the beauty.
On arriving at the hotel in late afternoon the day before, after her Burton autopsy, she'd walked out to the spot where Copperwaite and Sharpe had first encountered Katherine O'Donahue's naked body. In fact, Stuart Copperwaite, who had gallantly escorted her to the York Hotel, had offered to also accompany her to the Victoria Gardens Embankment. Below the bridge stumbled the same drunken bridgeman, who had frightened off the Crucifier and had run over the “evidence.” He foolishly waved at them as they searched the crime scene.
Jessica walked the path most likely taken by the Crucifier. Copperwaite and Sharpe had shrewdly assessed where the killer's “transport”-as they called his car-had most likely been parked so as to draw no attention. Copperwaite pointed out the spot. He also pointed out the likely trail where the body was carried toward water's edge before being dropped when the bridgeman's headlights surprised and frightened the killer or killers. No footprint impressions had been found as just enough rain fell in those hours before dawn to obliterate human tracks. Copperwaite explained, “But tire tracks were found and impressions taken that night. Unfortunately, the impressions matched literally hundreds of thousands of tires used in England, and so long as there remains no suspect, we have no suspect car to match impressions to.”
As she'd walked with Copperwaite last night, Jessica had asked, “How long have you and Sharpe been partners?”
“Not long at all, actually.” Copperwaite reminded her of Hugh Grant with some girth. He wore a perpetual, sly grin. “Sharpie lost his last partner in a gun battle over some drugs filtering in from Algiers. Nasty bit of luck. Then I come on with him, almost a month after. It's been two years now.”
“You seem awfully-I don't know-alike?”
“Alike? Sharp and me? Ha! As different as chalk and cheese, we are.”
“Close, then. You seem close.”
“Aye, that we are. Have to be close in every way, now don't we? Have to know the habits, the good and bad of one another to put your life in another's hands, you see. Isn't it done the same in your country?”
“Yes, very much so.”
“Sharpie's one of the best, if not the best. Ought to have had Boulte's job, you see, but then, you know how it goes. Over here, we have a saying 'bout that.”
She smiled knowingly but said, “Oh? And what's that?”
“Buggin's turn, we call it.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning every fool is given a turn at a job until all the fools have been exhausted. Meaning Sharpe was unfairly treated, and Boulte was promoted in order to demonstrate the height of stupidity in the Yard, to demonstrate Boulte's special brand of awe-inspiring incompetence.”
