The Cold Smell Of Sacred Stone

to tell everyone he met that he was Jesus. Marl Braxton's pathology was different, inasmuch as his fantasy was projected onto Garth, but I was still curious to see what effect, if any, my rebuttals of facts and common sense would have on him. The fallen D.I.A. operative with the top-secret past was intelligent and articulate; as long as he didn't suddenly decide to try and hand me my head, I found I was perfectly content to sit and discuss his nonsense with him.

'The doors of perception-true perception-were opened for Garth at the hands of Siegmund Loge,' Braxton patiently explained to me as he sat back down on the edge of his bed. 'The naked truth of our situation was deeply implanted in him, and it exploded into full bloom in his consciousness when you brought him Der Ring des Nibelungen.'

'Marl, I had exactly the same experiences-and I'd be just as happy if I never heard the Ring again.'

'Nobody ever has exactly the same experience as someone else. You were simply God's tool, your role to be Garth's companion and solace on his two great spiritual odysseys. The proof is in the fact that, even though you triumphed over Siegmund Loge, you didn't change the fact that our species was doomed. In fact, all during the time when you were resting on your parents' farm, you had to wrestle with the possibility that the two of you, with Mr. Lippitt, had doomed humanity when you destroyed Siegmund Loge.'

That touched a sensitive nerve, and I slowly finished my beer before I spoke again. 'What does the Archangel affair have to do with it?'

'The seeds for Garth's awakening had been sown by Siegmund Loge, but they lay fallow for years. They had to be watered by the nitrophenylpentadienal-which would have killed him, if it had not been cut off when it was. The Archangel affair not only saved his life, but provided the emotional catalyst which sent him into the holy sleep from which he awakened as the Messiah. In Garth's body, nitrophenylpentadienal became a holy substance.'

'Oh, come on, Marl; this is getting more complicated than Revelations.'

'The pattern is there,' the other man said earnestly, 'for those with eyes to see it. Like you, Siegmund Loge was a tool of God. He provided the crucible in which the soul of the son of God would be fired and reshaped. Also, he set up communes around the world. The people who were in those communes are out there, waiting; they'll know that Garth is the Messiah, and they'll form the first troops in an army of love and compassion that will change the world, and save us from extinction.'

'Bullshit,' I said with more feeling than I'd intended to show. 'Believe me, Marl, even the Messiah wouldn't want anything to do with the people who were in those communes. I mean, I'm talking about seriously stupid, absolutely mindless people-which is why Siegmund Loge was able to suck them into his operation in the first place. I've met and talked with some of those people, Marl; you haven't. You wouldn't be able to tolerate the company of any one of them for more than five minutes. Hell, they thought Loge was the Messiah; a few of them thought Loge was God.'

'Loge was a false Messiah; his true mission was to prepare the way for Garth, and this was accomplished.'

I shook my head. 'Garth told you you were crazy for thinking he's the Messiah. Does my brother believe any of this other business?'

'No,' Marl Braxton replied easily. 'In fact, he said the same things about the commune people you did.'

'But that doesn't make any difference?'

'That doesn't make any difference. Garth doesn't fully understand yet.'

'Then how can you be so damn sure that you understand so much? Does God speak to you?'

Something that might have been dangerous glinted for a moment in Braxton's dark eyes, then was gone. 'God doesn't speak to me, Mongo,' he said calmly. 'In fact, God doesn't speak at all. Hearing voices is Mama's problem, not mine; my maid of constant sorrows is-was-my problem.'

'Speaking of voices, Garth hardly says ten words at a time to me. Why does he spend so much time talking to everybody else?'

'Not everybody else; only those who understand pain.'

'If Garth has told you about Valhalla and Archangel, then you must know that I understand a few things about pain.'

'It's true that you've suffered great pain, but you've never been broken like Garth and me. For now, Garth's words are only for broken people.'

'The world isn't made up of broken people, Marl. Loge's lesson-if it can be called that-is that there are far too many insensitive, stupid people in the world, and they'll destroy us all.'

Loge's lesson was that people with fantastic notions like Marl Braxton's would destroy us all, but I thought it better to keep that thought to myself.

'Garth will change that,' Braxton said.

'How's he going to do that if he can only speak to broken people?'

'There are many more broken people than you think. Not all broken people end up in mental institutions. They're all around you, but you can't see them because you've never been broken. Garth knows who they are; he'll find them, and they'll find him.'

'Okay,' I said quietly, looking down at the floor. I was rapidly losing interest in Marl Braxton's pathology, and couldn't see any way in which it could help Garth. Quite the contrary.

'I guess we'll just have to see what happens.'

'What do you think is going to happen?'

'Garth will carry out his mission, and bring his message to the world. We will all be changed.'

'Okay. I can use a change.' 'Thanks for sitting down and talking with me, Mongo. I really appreciate it. In a nut house, time tends to drag.'

'You're welcome.'

'How did you get that scar on your forehead?'

'A bad guy cut me. With the help of a friend, I changed him.'

'You killed him.' It wasn't a question, and there was a faint hint of amusement in the other man's voice.

'I changed him.'

'The scar is fresh. You were cut fairly recently, right?'

'Right. Why?'

Braxton shrugged, but he continued to stare thoughtfully at my forehead, as if he were reading some message there. 'Just curious,' he said at last. 'Are you in a hurry? Do you have to be any place?'

'No.'

'Would you mind hanging around a while longer? I really enjoy your company.' He paused, laughed easily. 'There are too many crazy people around here who do talk to God.'

'I don't mind hanging around and talking, but I'm a little tired of the subject of my brother's divinity,' I said seriously.

'Then we'll drop it.'

'Why did you bring it up in the first place, Marl? Somehow, I have the sneaking suspicion that you knew what my reaction would be.'

'I wasn't sure. I wanted to see if, by now, you'd come to realize that Garth is the Messiah. You haven't, so that's that. I'd love to discuss some of your monographs with you, and have you sign my copies.'

'You've got it.'

'And you'll help me finish up my weekly allotment of beer?'

'I'll drink to that.'

Which I did. Marl Braxton and I talked easily for another hour or so, until Garth came back and joined us in the room. I left shortly afterward, depressed by the sight of Marl Braxton's Messiah sitting on the floor, head bowed, seemingly oblivious to both Braxton and me while he listened to his music.

I was skittish and ill at ease when I left the clinic, and I didn't feel like going back to my small apartment in the staff building. I drove into New York to see a show, just for something to do, and then treated myself to drinks and a good dinner before driving back to Rockland County.

But my sense of foreboding wouldn't leave me, and I couldn't sleep. I knew I had to make a decision one way or another on what to do with Garth, and then learn to live with it. I thought of calling my parents, which I had been doing every other night anyway, to ask for their advice, then decided against it. They were old, and it didn't seem