The Cold Smell Of Sacred Stone

carried metal detectors. I'd anticipated some kind of security check; I unstrapped the shoulder holster holding my Beretta and slung it over my shoulder, then ducked under a police barricade, skipped over a treacherous sea of thick electrical cables, and went up to the entrance.

'Here,' I said, holding out the gun to the burly, sandy-haired guard standing to the left of the door. 'I assume you'll want to take this off my hands before you let me in there.'

'What is it you want, Dr. Frederickson?' the thinner guard on the right said in a voice that was polite but cold. Both men ignored the gun I was holding out.

'I want to see my brother.'

'You can see him tonight, sir. You're much too early. Nobody is allowed in the building now but our people and the television technicians.'

'Garth's People used to be more hospitable.'

'I apologize, sir, for the inconvenience. We feel these measures are necessary for the security of some of the people who will be celebrating here with us tonight.'

'Check with Garth; he'll want to see me.'

'He's not to be disturbed,' the sandy-haired man said.

'Do you know where he is?' I asked the bigger man.

'He's not to be disturbed. We'll reserve a place for you in the reserved section if you'd like, Dr. Frederickson, but we can't let you in now.'

'I have something to give him; it's very important to him, and to Garth's People.'

'What?'

I slung the Beretta in its holster back over my shoulder, hefted the attache case. 'This.'

'What's in it, sir?'

'It's for Garth. If you're not authorized to put me in touch with my brother, at least let me inside to talk to Tommy Carling.'

The thinner man on the right switched on his metal detector, passed its steel wand back and forth over the surface of the case to an accompaniment of harsh, insistent buzzing. He shut off the detector, shook his head. 'There's no way you can go in there with that, Dr. Frederickson; not unless you show us what's inside.'

'Very well,' I said with an exaggerated sigh as I rested the case on my left forearm, unsnapped the clasps, lifted the lid, and shoved Whisper toward the two men. 'This is my gift to my brother and Garth's People.'

My little theatrical flourish had the desired effect; the eyes of both men opened wider and they took a step backward as they stared at Whisper.

The thinner man licked his lips, then looked at me. 'Is that. .?'

'Yes. It's the Great Knife. I want Garth to have it with him when he makes his announcement tonight.' I closed the case, took my gun and holster off my shoulder, and once again offered it to the two men. 'Now will you let me in to see Carling?'

The sandy-haired guard took my gun, set it down behind him, just inside the entrance to the bathhouse. 'I don't know where Tommy is at the moment, Dr. Frederickson,' the man said with just the slightest touch of awe in his voice. 'He's been all over the place supervising things all morning. But you go on in, and we'll send somebody to scare him up for you.'

I'd like to scare him up, I thought as I walked between the two guards, and I couldn't. But I was inside the bathhouse. And I was armed. As I'd hoped, the men with their metal detectors had been so distracted by all the hardware I was carrying upstairs, that they'd neglected to check downstairs; I still had my Seecamp in its holster strapped to my ankle. And I had Whisper.

Inside the cavernous bathhouse, hordes of workers and members of Garth's People were milling about, attending to their various tasks as they threaded their way up and down, back and forth across the hall through a polished wood sea of folding chairs tightly packed together in narrow rows. Speakers, klieg lights, and television cameras were mounted on the stone balcony ringing the hall, and at the far end, erected in front of the entrance to the showers, was a huge stage. At the lip of the stage was a lectern, and at the rear a huge bank of electronic equipment. Above the stage a massive green banner with the rings-and-knife logo of Garth's People hung suspended by wires strung from one of the four curved steel girders supporting the vaulted glass dome, which now glowed with milky light. I didn't like the light from that glass sky, which suffused the entire hall like a shroud.

Everything seemed to indicate that Carling planned to use Garth in whatever production he was planning, and logic dictated that Carling would have Garth locked up somewhere inside the bathhouse, ready to be marched out- drugged, or with a gun at his back-at the appropriate moment, if only to step through the curtains at the rear of the stage into bright television lights before being gunned down. At least that was the logic I had to operate on. If Garth was somewhere inside the building-and, if he wasn't, all of my machinations were going to be largely irrelevant-I had to find him. But first I had to run the gauntlet of Tommy Carling and Sister Kate, who sooner or later would learn that I was inside the bathhouse.

Wanting to get as far away from the main entrance as possible, I started walking casually down the side of the hall toward the massive stage. Carling intercepted me just as I passed a row of pea-green Port-O-Johns.

'Hello, Mongo,' the ponytailed male nurse and K.G.B. officer said as he stepped down out of a staircase. His voice was flat, his eyes cold, as he studied me, and he did not extend his hand.

'Hello, Tommy,' I replied, and forced a smile. The other man was not even bothering to play his usual role of good-natured, slightly effeminate healer, and I wondered why; it most certainly disturbed me. I heard a faint rustle in the darkness of the staircase behind him, but nobody emerged.

That, I thought, could very well be Sister Kate, riding shotgun. Something had happened to convince Tommy Carling that it was no longer necessary-or possible-to accommodate me with his fun and games, and I didn't like that one bit. 'How are you?'

'I'm just fine, Mongo,' Carling replied in the same flat voice. 'How are you?'

'About half.'

'What do you want here, Mongo?'

'Didn't you get the message?' I asked as I hefted the black leather case.

'I was told you'd brought the knife you call Whisper.'

'And which Garth's People call the Great Knife. I'd understood that it had become an important religious symbol for a lot of you, but you don't seem all that impressed-or even curious. Wouldn't you like to see it?'

'Why bring it now?'

'Because I thought it might be nice for Garth to have it with him tonight when he makes his announcement-I assume he's going to tell the world that he is, indeed, the Messiah. I thought his followers might enjoy the experience of actually seeing the Great Knife. Don't you?'

'Why didn't you bring it to him before? Why now?'

'Why not now?' I replied with a shrug. 'Better late than never. I want to make peace with my brother, Tommy. I still can't say that I believe he's the son of God, but there's no question that he's become a world-class religious leader, and will remain so for the rest of his life. I love him, I'm proud of him, and I just want him to have the knife; it means more to him and the rest of you than it does to me.'

'I'll give it to him.'

'No. This is a very personal thing for me, Tommy, and it will be for Garth too. I want to give it to him myself.'

'Then you'll have to give it to him tonight. I have express orders not to disturb him for anything, no matter how important it may seem to me.'

'When can I see him? I'd think he'd want to be carrying the Great Knife when he appears on stage.'

'I won't know when he's emerged from retreat before he actually appears here. You're welcome to stay around and wait if you'd like. There's plenty of work left to do, and I'll assign you to one of our setup crews. Then you'll know the minute he arrives.'

And Carling would be able to keep a close eye on me. 'I'd love to, Tommy, but I've got a luncheon date, and then a whole load of last-minute Christmas shopping to do. I figure I can't be back here before seven or eight. One of the guards said he'd be able to save a seat for me in the reserved section.'

'No problem,' Carling said evenly. 'I'll put you in the front row.'

'See you tonight, Tommy,' I said, and started back up the hall.

'Mongo?'