The Everborn (23 page)

There were a handful of seats strung along the choir loft outskirts and a prominent seat closest to the pulpit remained empty. Max couldn’t recall any fragment of what Bradshaw looked like; perhaps he’d never even seen the pastor before at all, although he was familiar with his well-publicized ministry. It didn’t look like the pastor was there. And likewise neither was BoLeve.

***

When Max ran into Jacob Bradshaw no more than several minutes later while snooping around the sides of the church building, not knowing who he was, he asked him, “Excuse me, I’m looking for Pastor Bradshaw. Is he inside?”

He had every intention of actually snooping around inside, situating himself next to those in prayer and politely asking if he or she could point out the beloved pastor, but he thought he’d check around outside first. Regardless of his own beliefs, he always held a respect for those in prayer. So far, whatever conspicuously dressed law official there was hadn’t paid him so much as a glance, and the squad cars outside had dwindled in number to only one.

That was a good thing, even with the change of Max’s attire, for if Matt had alerted anyone, Matt would’ve remembered that Max on occasion had been known to change clothes, and he would’ve stressed this caution to those concerned.

Bradshaw had been exiting his rear office with Mr. Yellowjacket and two other homely-looking individuals when Max crossed their paths, and when the pastor identified himself, Max flashed his own I.D. in a showcase of walleted clear plastic in turn, announcing he was a private detective and had just visited the motel crime scene.

Which, for the record, wasn’t exactly a lie.

Although in Bradshaw’s distracted worry and Max’s distracting official demure, it was an opportune moment for Max to get information while there was still time enough to get it.

And while there was still time enough for this information to get him to Simon Boleve.

Fate would take it from
there
. After
that.

After Bradshaw’s concerned entourage had departed to Max’s insistence, the two were alone at last.

***

The transpired fumes of Max’s Marlboro crept and expanded along the surface of the office ceiling. The bathroom-sized window and series of overhead air vents failed to provide the smoke with a route of escape, and it drifted freely through the air like clouds on film in elapsed time. The pastor was on the brink of asking the private detective to
please show some courtesy ‘til we’re through
, and he normally would have, but things were so overwhelming this morning that rude manners were excusable for any man who could help him.

The pastor’s office had clearly once been an automotive service office now straining for reverential respectability but falling far short. Max half expected to see remaining calendar photos of half-nude super models straddling sleek custom Trans Am’s. Books upon books neatly lined the walls on mounted shelves. A pushbutton phone rested beside a green blotter and tarnished desk lamp situated upon a mahogany desk. A traditional bearded Jesus hung smugly from behind framed glass over a tall metal file cabinet and was flanked by framed artless countrysides. A poster to Max’s right depicted a swirling mixture of electric guitars and crucifixes around words of bright white…ROCK SOLID WITH THE SOLID ROCK!

Pastor Bradshaw had the appearance of a resolute man, a man in charge of things, a man in his mid-fifties with greying hair who, when he looked at you, appeared as if he was sizing you up to either make a judgmental remark or to sell you something. But his eyes exhibited a mixture of sincerity and remorse and Max assumed that this was partly due to the worries of his missing daughter and her wrongfully departed boyfriend, but Max could not dismiss the feeling that those heartfelt eyes were somehow
always that way
.

“My wife and my eldest son are waiting to meet me to pray,” he told Max. “But any insight I can give you that I haven’t already shared with the other detectives...well, you understand. For the sake of any insight that you could give me, I am at your disposal. Who did you say you were?”

“Max Polito,” Max said, and together their hands met for a shake across the desk. “I’m very sorry about your daughter’s boyfriend, Pastor. I’m sure Alice will be back with you soon.”

“We’re trusting in the Lord,” the pastor said, and was about to continue, but lapsed into silence.

After a moment, the pastor went on, “Ben was a bright young man, however he faltered in his walk with the Lord. I believe utterly that he’s with Jesus right now. He and Alice had been seeing each other for...oh, a little while now. Alice always had trouble with authority.” He caught himself, “
Has
trouble. I mean, nothing illegal, although my wife caught her smoking marijuana in the backyard once and then there was the half-empty bottle of whiskey in her bottom dresser drawer. But this isn’t a generation gap kind of thing. I understand young people and these things are just learning experiences that young people go through. We tried to raise her right and these later years have found her making her own decisions with only herself to answer to and not really to my wife and me anymore, except of course what happens under my own roof. You know what I mean?”

“Of course,” Max said. His cigarette was out and he rose from his seat and cracked open the door, tossed it outside, and apologized with respect, finally.

“And Alice has been into this...” The pastor scooted his chair back, fumbled through a desk drawer, and withdrew a paperback novel. “…take a look.” He slapped the book face up upon the front of the desk beneath Max’s scrutiny.

Max blinked.

“God gave us His Word as an impeccable map to guide us through life’s highways and biways. This book and those like it steer us astray into the paths which lead us to destruction. I hate to sound all ‘fire and brimstone’, but evidently books like this led Ben and Alice to that godforsaken club Friday night and to that damnable motel. Look at that...this was the author I was told they both went to see...I found this in Alice’s closet a few weeks ago, part of her
collection
....” He pounded his fingertips upon the book cover above the author’s name.

Max picked the book up and scanned its dark, glossy cover. The artwork depicted a voluptuous woman with greenish skin garbed in a scarlet robe, reptilian tentacles protruding from her sides before outstretched wings risen high with scaly claws. Below the artwork were the words
VENOM OF THE GODS
- A NOVEL BY RALSTON COOPER, BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF
DARKHOUSE
.

Max politely but absently flipped through the book’s pages, as though he didn’t expect this familiar little presentation. Then he said, “Uh...Pastor, what do you know about Simon Boleve?”

Max had been almost hesitant to ask, had been patient and polite so far (in his eyes, give or take the cigarette), and when the anticipated question at last emerged from his lips, he nearly felt as though he might as well have been asking the pastor if he’d been masturbating lately. Perhaps it was his own fear of the question, which he would never admit.

“Simon?” the pastor said, as though this was a change of subject. “Why do you ask?”

Max shrugged with a sly innocence.

Bradshaw continued, “Yes, of course. Well, for starters, he’s been with us...it seems for a long time. A couple years. He’s a good man. Lonely, I guess reclusive, yes, but devout. He’s kind of a mystery, that one. But I’ve learned to trust him. Sparing you any speeches about the homeless...I may be sympathetic, but I’m no fool. They can take and take from you, and you give at first, but you know when you’re being used and you’re doing no good that way. No matter how low one’s gotten, it’s gotta be give and take. Any human being who’s lost all but his or her life has something to give back to himself once there’s a helping hand. Some people just don’t take the initiative once there’s someone to help them to their feet. Where would we be, if once we took our first steps as babies and we needed someone to keep us walking for the rest of our lives? The homeless are like that, learning to walk again. That’s when the give and take comes in. For all of us.”

“So,” Max said, sparing the interrogation, yeah, like the pastor did the speech, “you’re saying that Simon’s different. He’s a give and take kinda homeless person. You also say he’s a mystery. He’s a mystery to me too, by the way.” Max was purposely straightforward this time, and in his growing impatience he was becoming all the more sarcastic, albeit trying hard to be subtle.

“Simon has made himself an asset to our cause,” Bradshaw told him. His mind was a flare of bias questions. “We’ve been meeting his needs and he’s been meeting ours. He helps us around, tends to our gardening, fixes what needs fixing, repaints over occasional graffiti on our walls, unclogs our toilets. Yes, he is a give and take kind of person. And he’s no longer homeless. Now what do you really want of our poor Simon?”

“I know his history,” Max told him plainly. “And I'd like to catch up on his recent life and times.” He allowed a casual smile. “Just to set things straight and to go on to the
real
individuals responsible for your missing daughter and her boyfriend’s death. He might give us a clue, is all I’m saying. I just need to ask about him.”

“Why don’t you talk to him yourself,” the pastor said. “Until he finds a more suitable place, he lives upstairs. Above the sanctuary.”

19.

Knocking On Scratch’s Door

Matt McGregor had at first taken Max’s disconcerting dismissal from their meeting with a neutral curiosity. It was neutral in regards to his putting two-and-two-together, his dormant awareness, and it made him curious as to where in the hell Max
went
. He was also distracted by the
matters-at-hand
kind of things which always demanded the attention of the people in charge and today he was the person in charge.

When Max’s motives were first suspected by McGregor, he was immersed in Mrs. Clipboard’s show-and-tell flip-book of reports. He didn’t quite catch the tail-end of her presentation but instead found himself overwhelmed with insight and wondering what to do. His first impulse was to get Max on his cell phone, which was the safest option he had; he’d always respected Max’s instincts, as well as Max’s impulses and ingenuity. Before Matt dove into any extremes which would wound Max’s cause, contacting him first proved to be the best measure possible. But Matt had seen many a man proclaim to know what he was doing and soon afterwards end life or limb in an ill—foreseen demise.

Matt didn’t want that to happen to Max.

Not to mention the often times when Matt would ask him if he knew what he was doing, and Max would answer that he
didn’t know
, that he was making it up as he went along.

Well, that would be fine and swell for Indiana Jones to say, but Max didn’t have the happenstance charm of a screen character, and Max worried Matthew.

He went to his car at the end of the motel parking lot, a ‘91 Chevy Caprice of weathered white and misty chrome, went for his own cell phone and dialed Max’s number. There was a busy signal. This confounded him, and he swore harshly and dialed again. Busy. He dialed Max’s home number, on a whim. Busy also.
Max must be speaking to Melony
, was what came to mind.

And he swore harshly again.

For a moment he reasoned. It never occurred to him to radio in Max’s description to the guys at the church, for Max to be held at bay until Matt arrived. If it had occurred to him, there would’ve been a number of reasons --a number of
good
reasons-- for enforcing the idea.

But this was
Max
. He had faith in Max and he had to have legitimate reasons for the officers at the church to detain him.
Reportable
reasons, and he didn’t want to deal with that bullshit. He decided to keep it mum and he would handle it himself.

Immediately.

Just in case.

He returned to the motel room crime scene, caught the homicide detective Hugh Updike on his way ou, and confided that he was on his way to the Church on the Rock to continue his investigation. It was kind of like a child informing his parents where he was going to be and he felt that way.

He set out, alone, for
The Rock
.

***

Max followed the pastor up the rear stairwell within the church after a brief jaunt past the consoling glances of a handful of church attendees, up past the second-story choir room, until the two arrived at a door at the stairwell’s head.

“I thought I saw Simon earlier at the service,” Bradshaw said to Max. “He usually sits toward the back. He’s so self-conscious of his looks...”