Broken Saint, The (8 page)

Chapter 11

We were heading back to headquarters to try to track down
Martinez from Anti-Gang when the radio message told me the manager of Game
World phoned in about a kid named Mark Gerson who was acting real strange, how
it might be related to the Salizar case.

“Thanks a lot,” I said into the radio. “We’re heading
there now. Over.”

Game World was in the middle of one of the
shabbier blocks on Second Street. Three blocks from the heart of the business
district, this portion of Second was hit real hard when the mall went in twenty
years ago, and it never recovered. Besides the geek palace it had a store that sold
cigars and newspapers, a place that specialized in work shoes, and two bars.
The busted sidewalk was covered in swirling garbage, cigarette butts, dried
puke, and two or three street guys who turn coins into bottles of Thunderbird.

We walked past the three fourteen-year-olds,
dressed all in black, smoking and giving us a fuck-you-very-much look, pulled
open the big glass doors at Game World, and walked in.

A thirty-year-old guy, mostly bald with a full
beard, denim and flannel, walked over to us. Ryan was probably the first guy
wearing a suit, and I was maybe the only female ever, to set foot in his place.

“My name is Richard Williams,” he said. “I’m the
manager. I called the police.” He didn’t offer his hand. I was glad.

“My name is Seagate. This is Miner. Which one’s
this kid, Mark Gerson?” I looked around, spotted five different slouching
losers who could have been eighteen. The store was maybe thirty by forty feet.
I don’t have much of a memory for these things, but I think it might’ve been a
shoe store, then a gift shop. The green industrial carpet was covered with dark
stains. The walls were lined with cheap industrial display racks, full of boxed
games and all kinds of game hardware, new and old. A glass display case over
near the counter with the cash register contained dozens of comic books in
plastic sleeves. Many ways to spend all your money on worthless shit.

“We have a room in back for some of the regulars.”
Williams pointed with his thumb.

“That’s what Mark Gerson is?”

Williams nodded. “He’s here a lot. Sometimes I let
him crash here.”

“How long’s he been here this time?”

“Two or three days.”

“Is there a door goes out the back?”

“No, there’s a door to the alley behind the
register over there,” he said, “but nothing out of the back room.” There was
some kind of music playing, really annoying. Sounded like a car factory.

“You let Mark crash because he’s a really good
customer?”

“No, he never has any money,” Williams said. “But
he just kind of wanders around the place, helps customers find the stuff
they’re looking for. He knows all the old games, the old systems, you know,
Coleco, Atari, Commodore, Sega. We get a lot of customers looking for the old
shit. Plus, he writes a lot of the articles we put on our site. Reviews, that
kind of thing.”

I took a deep breath. It was the unmistakable
smell of my college dorm. “You supply the weed for him?”

“Absolutely not. I swear it.”

Ryan said, “We’re not here to bust you. All we’re
interested in is learning what we can about Mark Gerson. Long as you’re helping
us with that, we’re not going to go looking around for roaches.”

Williams exhaled deeply.

“So, Richard,” I said, “why’d you call the cops?”

“Mark seems to be kind of freaking out.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, I’m out here with customers, and I hear a
chair crash against the wall. Or he’s shouting. Then it gets real quiet. I go
look in the room, he’s sitting at the computer. Keeps saying this name, sounds
like Moroney. Something about angels.”

“All right, Richard, we’ll take it from here. You
go about your business.” He drifted away.

I turned to Ryan. “This make any sense to you?”

He nodded. “Moroni’s an angel in my Church. He
wrote part of the Book of Mormon, appeared to Joseph Smith. Told him where he
had buried the plates.” He paused. “Mind if I lead on the interview?”

“Because he’s a guy who’s scared of women?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. But no, because he’s
LDS, and I might be able to understand him better than you can.”

“Absolutely. Let’s see what we can get from him
about Maricel before we call the ambulance.”

The back room was hazy with cigarette and
marijuana smoke. It had a few scruffy couches around the perimeter, with three
widescreens hanging from the walls, their cords dangling down to a tangle of
surge protectors and extension cords along the baseboard. In the middle of the
room were four wooden tables with computers set up on them.

Mark was sitting at one of the tables, typing away.
He had a pale face full of baby fat and acne, his brown hair oily and matted.
He had a scraggly goatee which you had to look at real hard to see. From ten
feet away I could smell him.

He didn’t seem to hear us open the door. We walked
over to him, slow so as not to freak him out. But he seemed calm. He was just
concentrating on the screen.

“Hey, Mark. My name is Karen Seagate; this is my
partner, Ryan Miner. We’re police officers.”

He lifted his head and turned to me, then to Ryan.
“They send you here to arrest me?”

Ryan stepped in. “Who would have sent us, Mark?”

I pulled back a little.

“The angels. Moroni.” He said it matter-of-fact,
like he’d just gotten an email heads-up.

Ryan said, “Why would the angels have sent us?”

“I have sinned. Beyond redemption. I have killed our
Heavenly Mother.”

Ryan nodded his head and said, “When did you do
that, Mark?”

Mark gazed off into the distance. “I sinned with our
Heavenly Mother and then I killed her. Moroni is here to kill me.”

“Who was our Heavenly Mother, Mark? Did she have a
name?”

“She’s spirit now.”

Ryan said, “What was her name, Mark?”

“She’s not dead, she’s spirit now.”

I could hear some sounds from the store on the
other side of the door. A car or small truck was heading down the alley beyond
the wall in this horrible room.

“I understand that, Mark,” Ryan said. “Do you know
how she died?”

“She’s spirit now.”

The room fell silent for a moment. Ryan tried
another approach. “How did you learn that she’s spirit?”

“Moroni told me.”

“Does Moroni talk to you a lot?”

“Moroni talks to me all the time.”

“Do you see Moroni now?”

“Moroni is standing next to you.”

Ryan turned to his side, then nodded. “Did you
kill Maricel, Mark?”

“I killed our Heavenly Mother, and the Lord has
sent Moroni to kill me.”

“We need to talk with you about Maricel. Do you
think Moroni will mind?”

“I don’t want to talk to you anymore.” He turned his
attention back to his computer screen.

“Mark, we need to talk. It’s important. It’s about
someone hurting Maricel.”

“Nobody can hurt Maricel now.” He smiled. “She is
spirit, and she is going to the Celestial Kingdom.”

“Listen, Mark,” Ryan said, “I know you’re upset
about Maricel, and so are we. We need you to help us figure out who hurt
Maricel.”

His face contorted into a scowl. “Fuck you,” he
shouted. He jumped out of his chair, knocking it over. “Fuck you, too,” he screamed
at me. “Fuck you both.” He rushed at Ryan and threw an awkward punch at his
face.

Ryan was awfully good at Krav Maga. I wasn’t
worried. Ryan ducked the punch, pushing Mark’s right arm away, swiveling him
one-eighty, then came up behind him, pinning his arms to his side. “Calm down,
Mark,” Ryan said.

I had my cuffs out and looked at Ryan.

He shook his head and said softly, “I got it,
Karen.”

I walked back toward the corner of the room, away
from Ryan, Mark, and whatever angels the kid was seeing.

“Okay, Mark,” Ryan said. “Let’s calm things down
now. We’re going to sit over here, let you take a minute.” Ryan half escorted
him, half pushed him toward his chair in front of the computer.

Mark settled onto the chair. “Moroni is here
already,” he said and started laughing. Then, the laughing stopped instantly.
Mark turned toward the screen and started tapping the keyboard.

Ryan pulled me aside and led me over to the other
side of the room, where we sat down on some folding chairs near the wall. “Let
me have another go at him,” Ryan said.

“What if he’s armed? He’s obviously out of his
mind. We have to get him over to the hospital.”

“Yeah, I know, he’s having a psychotic episode. He
probably hasn’t taken his meds since he heard about Maricel. Probably hasn’t
slept much. But if I can have five minutes with him before they sedate him we
might be able to figure out how he fits in. Just give me another shot at him.”

I nodded, and we sat there for five minutes, watching
Mark type on the computer. He paid no attention to us. If Moroni was still in
the room, Mark wasn’t paying any attention to him, either.

Ryan walked over to within three feet of him. “What’re
you working on?”

“A game.”

“Yeah, what’s it about?”

“Book of Mormon.”

“You’re telling the story?”

Mark was looking at the screen. “The new story.
About how I betrayed the Lord with our Heavenly Mother and then killed her.”

“What happens to you in the story?”

“The Lord kills me.”

“The Lord is infinitely merciful, Mark. He
wouldn’t kill you, would He, Mark?”

“The Lord showed me His mercy after I killed my
brother. But when I killed His wife, He decided to kill me. Moroni told me
that.”

“Let me talk to Moroni now,” Ryan said.

“Do you see Moroni?”

“Yes, I do. Moroni is right over there,” Ryan
said, pointing to the corner of the room where two couches came together. “Don’t
you see him there?”

Mark started smiling. “Yes, I see him there.
Please talk to Moroni now. Tell him I didn’t mean to kill our Heavenly Mother.”

Ryan turned to face that corner of the room. “Moroni,
Mark is telling the truth. He didn’t mean to kill Maricel. It was an accident.”
Ryan paused.

Mark looked confused, then he began to smile. “Heavenly
Father has forgiven me.”

Ryan smiled, too, and went over to hug Mark. “I
knew our Lord would not punish you.”

All of a sudden, Mark began to cry,
uncontrollably. “I sinned with Maricel.”

“Heavenly Father knows what you have done, and He
knows you did not mean to. He recognizes your contrition, Mark, and He forgives
you.” Ryan stroked the boy’s matted hair. “The Lord loves you, Mark. He has
always loved you. And He will always love you.”

I walked over to the two of them. “Tell us about
Maricel, Mark,” I said. “What was your relationship with Maricel?”

Mark was still crying, tears all over his face,
snot on his top lip. “I met Maricel on August 13, at 2:35
pm
, when she arrived here in Rawlings.”

“She had just flown in from the Philippines?”

“Yes, from the Philippines. My father had arranged
it with the Church.”

“You mean the Catholic orphanage where she lived
in the Philippines?”

“She lived in an orphanage run by the Church. She
was my friend. She thought I was her friend. But when she called me, I couldn’t
answer her. And then she slipped and fell. She fell into the spirit world. I
killed our Heavenly Mother.”

I looked over at Ryan, who was on the phone,
calling the hospital. I heard him telling them to kill the sirens.

It took ten minutes for the paramedics. There were
two of them, each as big as Ryan. They came into the back room where Mark
Gerson was now seated at his computer.

Mark looked up when the two men came in. He turned
to Ryan. “Are they here to take me away?”

Ryan said, “You should go with them, Mark. Moroni
sent them to help you. Moroni and Heavenly Father are going to help you.”

Mark Gerson started giggling as the two paramedics
led him out of the back room.

I was sitting on a folding chair, looking down at
my hands. Ryan came over and sat next to me.

I said, “Did you understand what the hell he was
saying?”

“Surprisingly, quite a bit of it.” Ryan looked
wrung out. “Maricel was our Heavenly Mother, the wife of Heavenly Father.”

“God has a wife?”

“Some LDS people think so, some not.”

“And Maricel was God’s wife?”

“Apparently.”

“And Mark killed her.”

“Well, that’s where it got a little confusing. I’m
pretty sure Mark killed Maricel, or thinks he did, or had a sexual relationship
with her, or maybe he didn’t. Or Hector did, and Mark really didn’t like that.”

I just looked at him. “That’s what you’ve figured
out? I don’t know anything about your church, plus I’m dumb as shit, and I got
that far.”

Ryan was looking off across the room, his brow
furrowed.

“What is it?”

Ryan said, “Remember when Mark said his father
arranged it with his Church?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m wondering how the LDS Church has anything to
do with Al Gerson arranging for Maricel to come over here as an exchange
student. Wouldn’t he be arranging things through the Catholic Church if she’s
been brought up in one of their orphanages?”

“The LDS Church could have helped with the
arrangements in some way. They’ve got all kinds of missionaries in the
Philippines, right?”

“Mark said Maricel lived in an orphanage run by
the Church.”

“So what? He’s obviously got scrambled eggs for
brains. He could’ve meant to say the Catholics.”

Ryan was shaking his head. “When a Mormon says
‘the Church,’ he’s referring to only one Church.”

“The kid says he killed God’s wife, and you think
he’s confused about which church he’s referring to?”

“No,” Ryan said. “I don’t think he’s confused at
all.”