Microsoft Word - willingservants-vcw-061715, page 25
from the nightstand flew across the room at her, and she barely ducked
in time. It shattered into dust against the wall, breaking a hole in the
plaster. Brushes, bottles of cosmetics and perfume swept off a mirrored
dresser, flying at her. She raised her hand, but a heavy bottle caught her
in the cheek, rocking her head back and drawing blood. Books rained
from a shelf above her head, heavier volumes blasting at her like
rectangular cannonballs.
The anguished moan blasted in her ears, a chorus of misery and
distress and fear. Mara covered her ears as more bric-a-brac sizzled
through the air like shrapnel, pelting her, cutting her, knocking her
around. She knew she had to get out and ran to the closest window. It
flew open at her touch then slammed down on her hand with a crack.
Crying out, she shoved hard at the bottom of the upper frame,
loosening it just enough to pull free. She heard a whizzing sound in the
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air and ducked. A dictionary smashed through the glass, inches from
her head.
Mara took it as a sign. She ran to the bed, gathering up all the covers,
and tossed them halfway through the broken window. Scrambling
through, she felt more glass breaking under her hands but not cutting. A
shove came from behind. Mara plunged into open space, arms and
legs thrashing. A six-foot dive onto the hard earth, she grunted with
the impact.
For a long moment, she lay on the cold, damp grass, fighting to
catch her breath. Moving each limb a little, she checked for broken
bones. Her fingers on her right hand were definitely broken from the
slamming window. But other than a sting that ran through her whole
body from the shock of impact, she felt okay. Mara picked herself up.
″Stinking piglet.″
Mara backed away. Walking down the flagstone path, a huge
stone raised above her head, Dana Scarpetti approached.
A slap on the side of her head made her ear ring. Mara looked
but saw no one. Another slap struck her face, stinging her nose and
drawing blood.
″Do it, Dana, get rid of her!″ a disembodied voice shouted. Clawed
hands grabbed Mara′s arms, shoulders, tearing into her clothing.
″Finish it!″
Stumbling, Mara tried to shove through her invisible attackers.
Dana lurched forward, rock poised.
Shoving hard, Mara managed to get around the corner of the
house. Deep scratches opened on her hands, and heavy blows rained
on her as if a crowd had circled her, holding her for the slaughter.
The door to Mike′s workshop stood a foot away.
From behind, Dana swung at her with the rock. Mara jerked
back, feeling the cold granite scrape her temple. But Scarpetti had
thrown herself off balance. Mara lifted her foot, kicking the woman
behind the knee. The old lady went down with a snarl.
Mara reached the doorknob, praying it wasn′t locked. It turned.
Dana gained her feet, charging forward. Mara opened the door,
using it as both a club and a shield. A solid, satisfying thud followed
Mara′s swing. Without looking, she slipped into the black basement
workshop, slamming the door behind her.
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Her foot caught something, and she fell to the hard floor, bruising
her knees. At the door, she heard claws scratching, scratching, as if
trying to claw the wood apart. The fury, the hatred confused Mara. She
couldn′t imagine doing anything to elicit such emotion from anyone, or
anything. And the old woman, Dana Scarpetti—all Mara had done
was sign an autograph, for God′s sake. Why? Why was her life slipping
into chaos, into violence and anger and fear?
″I just want it to stop,″ she whispered in the dark, hugging her
knees to her chest.
″I can make it stop.″
Her eyes saw nothing in the complete dark, but the voice sounded
so familiar.
″George?″
A light flared, revealing the round face of her friend as he lit a
cigarette. Then, he was just barely visible in the red light from the
ember. George smiled at her, puffing. There was something wrong with
his face, lines she didn′t remember.
″All you have to do is ask me.″ His voice soft, smooth and now
lacking the trace of Spanish accent he′d always tried to hide,
beckoning to her, soothing her.
″Please, make it stop,″ she said, reaching out to him.
The claws stopped scratching at the door. Tiny red eyes opened all
around her at about the level of a small dog′s and circled her, moving
closer with each orbit. She counted five pairs of fierce, animal eyes.
Glowing, the tip of the cigarette fell, casting George′s face in darkness.
She felt a hand take hers, lift her to her feet.
When the cigarette rose again, it revealed a different face. It wasn′t
plump, jovial George in the dark at all, but a narrow head with sharp
features, painfully visible cheekbones.
It was Father Joaquin.
With huge strength, he yanked her close to him, his arms wrapping
around her. The cigarette fell away into blackness. As it faded, the
circling eyes blazed. It was then Mara realized that the burning eyes
were not roaming the cellar. They were inside her.
CHAPTER 20
BRADFORD SAT in the rectory parlor flipping through his notebook
while Monsignor Capelli called in a vandalism report to the police
department. He found the number and pulled out his cell phone.
″It′s getting pretty serious. I′m sorry about the late hour. Will you
come?″ Bradford asked.
Capelli ambled into the parlor, looking sideways at Bradford.
″Who are you calling?″
″St. Mark′s. The rectory, do you know it? See you then.″
″Who the hell are you calling?″ Capelli demanded as Sam hung up.
″A friend.″
″A friend like Father William?″ the monsignor scoffed. ″Why did
he call you, of all people, Detective?″
″Lieutenant, actually.″
Capelli waved dismissal. ″It′s that message sliced into the poor
bastard′s back, isn′t it. I′ve seen it before, but I have the feeling this one
wasn′t meant specifically for me. You want to confess, my son?″
″What do you mean, you′ve seen it before?″ Bradford put his
phone in his pocket.
″You first, Lieutenant. You′re the one with the crucifix in his
pocket.″ Capelli lowered himself into a soft chair. ″You were expecting
something of this sort.″
″Something,″ Bradford said, ″but nothing of this sort.″
″You talked to Tarter the other day. I overheard some of it—
something about demonic possession, as I recall.″
″You frequently listen in on private conversations?″
″When they concern me, yes.″
Bradford raised an eyebrow. ″How did this concern you?″
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Capelli held up a gnarled hand. ″Young man, in every Catholic
parish in this country, there is a lowly diocesan priest, a man considered
good-hearted and of sound judgment but not a star, not a people-
person, not cut out to preside over a church. Maybe someone who
questions authority too much, perhaps speaks his own mind too often.″
Bradford pursed his lips. ″You′re talking about yourself?″
″Yes, in this immediate instance, I′m speaking of myself. However,
like me, these outspoken, good-hearted sound judgers are put in the
background of the faith. Way, way in the background, to the one
office both completely necessary and completely frowned upon by the
Church.″ Capelli sneered. ″The order of exorcist.″
The cop raised his head, looking hard at the elderly cleric. ″You′re
an exorcist?″
″No, I am the exorcist for the Diocese of Oakland.″ Capelli put his
elbows on his knees, folded his hands and rested his chin atop them.
Bradford let it sink in.
″So tell me, Lieutenant. Why did William call you; why do you carry
around a crucifix, and why are you asking a priest about possession?″
Capelli, sensing Bradford′s hesitation, said, ″Technically, I′m a priest,
too. You can say anything to me in confidence.″
″It happened about twenty years ago.″ Bradford closed his eyes,
and sighed.
* * *
Monsignor Francis Arturo Capelli sat through Bradford′s story without
moving, without expression save the faraway look in his deep-set
brown eyes. In the silence following, he said, ″I believe you′re right,
Lieutenant. I think we have a problem.″
″What do we do about it?″ Bradford said, frustration rising.
″We find it,″ Capelli said simply. ″We fight it, and destroy it.″
″How do we do that?″
Capelli rose from his chair. ″I have a story for you, Lieutenant,
but I believe your brothers in arms are in the church. They′ll want a
statement. I assume you don′t want them to know you′re here?″
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Bradford nodded. Capelli left him alone in the stuffy parlor with
mismatched, over-padded chairs and religious knickknacks lining
shelves and furniture tops. The lack of dust on all the tiny, fragile
objects said a lot about the rectory housekeeper’s vigilance. Capelli
returned, creeping silently and slowly like an aged spider to his perch.
″My last year at seminary,″ he said, ″before Holy Orders, I thought I
had the world by the nuts. Faced down Hitler in Germany and
temptation in France as an army corpsman. I thought I had sand.
Then I met Father Stan.
″He was a red-faced, hard drinking Pollock, an old-school priest,
a Jesuit. He taught demonology and the rite of exorcism back in the
day when the Church still believed in fighting evil. Even back then, a
lot of priests didn′t believe in the devil beyond a symbolic philosophy,
fairytales and boogie-men. I was among them, I admit. Several of us had
been through the War, thought we knew what hell was all about. Father
Danaslowski would curse you out in Latin for half an hour, make you
feel small, stupid, naive.
″In a town about eighty miles from the seminary, violent murders,
inhumanly cruel and savage, plagued the people and the sheriff.
Rumors spread around, Nazi spies trying to demoralize the U.S.,
werewolves, that kind of thing. Father Stan read about it in the Denver
Post and thought we might take a look. He brought us there in the
seminary car, told us we′d be his assistants. For what, we didn′t know.
″Father Stan asked the sheriff why these crazy rumors were flying
around. The sheriff told him that word got out about pentagrams being
carved into the victims′ skin. In the movies of the day, you could
spot a werewolf by a pentagram on the palm, and the Nazis liked to
use all kinds of symbols. Stan was a gritty hard ass though, and he
got the sheriff to show him the evidence.
″So the sheriff shows him some crime scene photos, expecting
Father Stan to get his fill quick enough. The victims were boys, all
between eleven and thirteen. The killer ripped their heads off, sometimes
stuffing things in their mouths. The most brutal thing anyone had seen in
this country, I imagine. At least, at that time.
″Stan looks over the evidence, including a map of the crime scenes.
Tells the sheriff he′ll pray on the matter. So he prays, but he also drives
around with us, visiting all the points on the map. A few days later, he
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goes back and tells the sheriff either let us help bring the man to justice,
or we′d go do it ourselves. At this point, another boy had gone missing.
People were up in arms. So the sheriff, being an elected official, wisely
agrees. Father Stan told him to gather as many deputies as he could
and meet us that night at a church near the center of town.
″It turns out, you see, that the murders all occurred about a block
or so west of all the churches in town, save that one. Churches make
demons all the more angry, all the more vicious. I guess it just
irritates them. Sure enough, in an abandoned shack a block from the
church, they find the boy, still alive. But the murderer, he′s there too,
a tiny slip of a man, not much more than five feet tall. He attacks the
deputies, striking one in the head hard enough to crack his skull
open. The deputies open fire on the man, but he′s not falling down.
Father Stan tells them to hold the man down. They all tackled him,
five men it took to hold him, myself included. I′ve never felt such power
in a man. Immediately, Stan whips out the holy water, spraying and
blessing. The murderer screams and thrashes around while Stan goes
into the ritual. The little man broke free, killing another deputy,
breaking my right wrist. He grabs Father Stan by the throat, so he can′t
talk, can′t say the words of the ritual.
″All at once, Stan was filled with a brilliant light, an awesome,
burning glory that seemed to ooze out of his very skin. Stan cast the
man to the ground, and a bright flame appeared, engulfing Stan′s
arm with a light brighter than a welding torch. As he made the sign
of the cross, the Possessed man was cut in half, burning the devil
right out of him.″ Capelli nodded.
Bradford rubbed his chin. ″Quite a story.″
″We had no idea what had happened. And that′s when Stan
showed us his right hand. Withered, it was, horribly scarred and
burned, with the fingers and thumb all fused together. Like he was still
holding something. I asked him what happened. Stan said, when the
murderer grabbed him by the throat, and everything was going dark,
the only thing he could think to do was pray to St. Michael for help.
Apparently, the Archangel lent Father Stan his burning sword, but the
righteous flame was too much for even a man of God like Father Stan
Danaslowski. Maybe, sitting here, it′s too much for you to believe. But I
was there.″
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The lieutenant shrugged. ″So where can we find a flaming sword?″
″You make light. The matter′s in God′s hands, Lieutenant. We′ll
find the bastard, and we′ll fight him, but only God can provide us
with a way to defeat him.″
″You have to pray to St. Michael for the sword,″ a female voice
came from the kitchen, ″and hope to invoke him during the ritual.″
Capelli, expression caught between surprise and outrage, made
popping noises with his lips, staring. Bradford stood up. Still half in
her sleepwear, rubbing her eyes, Holly Owen stepped to the threshold
of the parlor.
″Sorry, the back door was wide open.″
Bradford cleared his throat. ″Monsignor Capelli, this is Reverend
Holly Owen.″
Holly walked to the monsignor′s chair and took his hand. ″Nice
to meet you, Monsignor. I didn′t mean to butt in, but I assume we′re
talking about casting out demons?″
″We are,″ Bradford said.
″We are not, ″ Capelli said. ″We′re talking about the rite of exorcism,
a Catholic rite, Reverend.″
″I beg to differ,″ Holly raised a finger. ″If you′re not reciting the
ritual as prescribed, you′re moving into different territory. Invoking
St. Michael is something outside your faith, Monsignor, more in the
realm of the Pentecostal or Voudoun. But when you think about it,
most older religions must′ve had some exorcising ritual. The Jews don′t
now, but they may have in Biblical times. Even polytheists would′ve
had a need for it, don′t you think?″
Capelli scowled at her. ″What?″
″Have a seat,″ Bradford offered for the monsignor.
The reverend sat on the edge of one of the overstuffed chairs,
crossing her legs. Bradford was disappointed that she was wearing
sweatpants and tennis shoes.
″We can have theological debates all night, but that never gets us
anywhere.″ Holly said.
″So,″ Monsignor Capelli′s head jutted forward, turtle-like, ″why
are you here, Reverend?″
Holly Owen glanced at Bradford, then back at Capelli. ″Aren′t
we all here for the same reason? We have a demonic presence on our
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doorsteps. We need to hunt it down and destroy it. Or are we planning
a bingo night?″
″I′ve been at this since before your mother was born, missy,″
