Fatal Flaw Part 37

And then they found the body of the Sterrett boy in the lake at the belly of the quarry.

I WASN'T a part of the official probe. I know you've already talked to the chief, and so I'll let stand whatever it was he says about what they found and how they investigated. That wing of the Sterrett family were buried in our cemetery, but they were not members of our congregation, and so, beyond the normal sadness I have upon learning of the death of any promising youth, I didn't think this much affected the Prouixs or me. But then I heard that maybe it was Grady Pritchett they were looking at as the killer. And then I heard that this Jesse Sterrett, whom I knew to be a good-looking boy, had been the best baseball prospect to come out of the county in fifty years. I knew then that Hailey was somehow at the heart of this tragedy, and I sought her out. a part of the official probe. I know you've already talked to the chief, and so I'll let stand whatever it was he says about what they found and how they investigated. That wing of the Sterrett family were buried in our cemetery, but they were not members of our congregation, and so, beyond the normal sadness I have upon learning of the death of any promising youth, I didn't think this much affected the Prouixs or me. But then I heard that maybe it was Grady Pritchett they were looking at as the killer. And then I heard that this Jesse Sterrett, whom I knew to be a good-looking boy, had been the best baseball prospect to come out of the county in fifty years. I knew then that Hailey was somehow at the heart of this tragedy, and I sought her out.

I looked for her at the house, the school, I asked her friends. No one knew where she was, no one had seen her. Up and down the valley I drove, searching to no avail while the bitter lines of the poetry I had been reading tied themselves into knots in my mind. "And I am the arrow," "And I am the arrow," wrote the poet, wrote the poet, "the dew that flies suicidal." "the dew that flies suicidal." On the spur of the moment I thought to check the quarry. On the spur of the moment I thought to check the quarry.

There was yellow tape around the fence, but I ducked under it and through the rip in the fencing and clambered down the steep slope to the narrow ledge above the water. There, behind a large outcropping, curled like a lizard in hiding, I found her.

I stooped beside her on the ledge and said nothing for a long moment and waited for her to acknowledge my presence, which she failed to do.

"He was the one," I said finally.

She gave no answer.

"He was the one, Hailey, the one who brought a smile to your lips and a flush to your cheeks."

"Stop," she said quietly.

"What happened?"

"I don't know. I don't, don't know."

"No? They say it was Grady Pritchett that did it. The police are centering their investigation on him."

"It wasn't Grady."

"And how do you know that?"

"Because Grady is a coward."

"Maybe he is, but he's the one they're looking at. He's the one who will shoulder the blame even if it was someone else that did the deed."

"Maybe it was an accident."

"Yes, maybe. Wonderful athletes often are the clumsiest in their footing. But tell me, Hailey, who knew about you and the Sterrett boy?"

"No one, kids at school maybe."

"Did your uncle?"

She looked at me, her red-rimmed eyes.

"'To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice.' Don't hide it, Hailey, tell me. Who did this to young Jesse? Who did this to you?"

"Stop. Please."

"I think I know."

"You don't know anything."

"I think I know. Let me read you something you might recognize." I took a paper out of my pocket. "It's from a poem I've been reading."

She turned her face to me, puzzled, but as I started to read from the Plath poem "Daddy," she curled her body defensively as if to ward off blows.

"'I was ten when they buried you,'" I recited. "'At twenty I tried to die and get back, back, back to you. I thought even the bones would do. But they pulled me out of the sack, and they stuck me together with glue. And then I knew what to do. I made a model of you, a man in black with a Meinkampf look and a love of the rack and the screw. And I said I do, I do.'"

"Shut up."

"I want to help," I said. "Let me help. But for me to help, you must step out of your hole and tell me what is happening. I can't do anything if you won't tell me. Save Grady, Hailey, and save yourself, too."

She didn't respond. She lay there, curled like a lizard, thinking, and I stayed beside her in silence. Waiting for her to speak, waiting for her to tell me something, everything.

"You want to help me and help Grady?" she said finally.

"Yes," I said. "I can and I will."

"Then, this is what you do. You play cards with Grady's father, he trusts you, I'm sure. You tell him I'll get Grady cleared of all charges in exchange for something."

"Yes," I said, hoping she was ready to tell me all.

"Tell him I want a college education for me and Roylynn, college and graduate school if that's what we want. Tell him in exchange for him financing our route out of this stinking little town, I'll make sure Grady is cleared. Do you got that, Reverend?"

"Yes."

"All right," she said. "Let me know when it is all agreed, and I'll talk to the police."

"Where will you be?"

"Here, I'll be right here. I've got no place else to go."

I MADE the deal. When I proposed it to Mr. Pritchett, he snarled at me, a Scotch in his hand, and nodded, and that was that. I ran back to the quarry and took Hailey with me to the police. I expected then that she would tell them what had happened, tell the truth, that the evil would be taken care of, I was certain of it. But, as always with Hailey, she betrayed my expectations. She insisted on seeing Grady first, and only then did she tell her story to the police, and a clever story it was. She saved Grady, financed her college and law degree, gave her sister a chance, everything she said she would do, but she did it all with a lie. the deal. When I proposed it to Mr. Pritchett, he snarled at me, a Scotch in his hand, and nodded, and that was that. I ran back to the quarry and took Hailey with me to the police. I expected then that she would tell them what had happened, tell the truth, that the evil would be taken care of, I was certain of it. But, as always with Hailey, she betrayed my expectations. She insisted on seeing Grady first, and only then did she tell her story to the police, and a clever story it was. She saved Grady, financed her college and law degree, gave her sister a chance, everything she said she would do, but she did it all with a lie.

It wasn't enough, I couldn't just leave it at that. I had no evidence of what I thought had really happened, nothing more than the rantings of a suicidal poet, no witnesses who would back up my suspicions, but still I could not do nothing. I was compelled to do something. And so it was that I summoned Lawrence Cutlip to meet me in the chapel on a sunny Thursday afternoon.

He stood before me with his dangerous forward lean, a fresh wound on his cheek, his overalls spattered with the blood of slaughtered cattle. He held in his huge, hairy hands a rusted spade with a long wooden handle. We were in the center aisle of the chapel, the door to the outside world behind him, the cross behind me. He stared and smiled, and I felt a fear I had never known before and have never known since.

"I don't have much time," he said. "I've got some digging to do. So let's have it, then."

I didn't even want to know what he was digging or why, the possibilities that flitted through my mind were terrifying enough. I braced myself against the side of a pew to stop my shaking, and then, without pleasantries, I brought up the purpose of our conversation.

"You need to leave this town. This town, this county, this state, those girls. You need to leave, now, and never come back."

He tilted his head at me like a dog. "What are you saying there, Reverend?"

"I know what you are and what you've done. I know everything."

"You're kidding with me, right?"

"I am serious as my faith."

"Aw, you don't know what the h.e.l.l you're talking about."

"I'm talking about you and those girls. You and that boy. Leave now, or I'll tell all."

He stared at me, a realization dawning in his eyes. "Who you been listening to? Hailey? Has she been blabbing? She's a lying b.i.t.c.h, always has been. You can't go around listening to a mongrel b.i.t.c.h like her."

"You need to leave."

"Leave, h.e.l.l, that would be the best thing for me. Don't you think I want to leave? Don't you think I wanted to leave ever day of the past eight years? I done everything for those girls. They'd have nothing without me, nothing. They'd be on the street, starving or whoring, I wasn't taking care of them. I gave the best part of my life to them, sacrificed it straight up, spent my days butchering cows and my nights tending to their wants. But does anyone ever care about my my wants? I've given up everything for them, and this is what I get in return, lies and accusations. They're both a couple of halfbreed ingrates. Their father wasn't a hundred percent, I told my sister that before she ever married that boy. Any wonder then at what is going on with his demon offspring? One slices her wrists because she wants to be the center of attention, the other's now telling lies about me. They's bad kids, that's just the way they is. Everything that's happened is their fault. There's something wrong with them, I've always knowed that, something sinister. But you, Reverend, believing them lies. You should be ashamed." wants? I've given up everything for them, and this is what I get in return, lies and accusations. They're both a couple of halfbreed ingrates. Their father wasn't a hundred percent, I told my sister that before she ever married that boy. Any wonder then at what is going on with his demon offspring? One slices her wrists because she wants to be the center of attention, the other's now telling lies about me. They's bad kids, that's just the way they is. Everything that's happened is their fault. There's something wrong with them, I've always knowed that, something sinister. But you, Reverend, believing them lies. You should be ashamed."

"You leave now, right now, take your truck and go and never come back, or I'll make the calls."

"Aw h.e.l.l, go ahead and make your calls. No one'll believe your a.s.s anyways."

"Yes, they will. I'm a man of G.o.d. And Hailey will back me up. And Roylynn from the hospital will back me up. And your sister will back me up, you know she will, when you're in jail and she's no longer afraid of the back of your hand. And as for the boy? Where was it you received that slice on the cheek? Did it bleed much? It's a wonder what they can do now in matching up blood."

He stared at me hard, and his eyes grew cold, he hefted the shovel in his hands. "I could kill you right now," he said. "Stick this shovel in your chicken neck and pop your head right off."

"I know you could, without a second's thought, kill me now in this house of G.o.d. But you know that someone's seen you come in, that someone knows you're here. If you kill me, they'd lock you up for sure, lock you up till they pull the switch. And you want to know something?" I took a step forward. "I hope you do. It would solve the problem for good. So don't just talk about it, do it. Do it or leave."

I stood face to face with evil for that moment, watched the shovel twitch as if it wanted to launch itself into my neck, watched as the anger played like a screeching chord across his face. He was ready to hit me, crush me, do anything to bend me to his will, but I stood as steady as my feverish fear would let me and held my ground.

And then a smile, a lean, cold smile. "I've been thinking of leaving anyway," he said. "Them girls is growed up enough. It's time to be on my way. I guess I will go, head out west, just as soon as I pick up my stake. Edmonds and Doc Robinson owe me enough to get a good start out there in Vegas."

"They don't owe you a thing. You've been cheating them for years, dealing from the bottom."

"Lies, lies, and more lies. You you're just a d.a.m.n thief of lies."

"I've seen it, watched it happen over and over."

"They won't believe you. They know me. They're my friends."

"You have no friends, and I'm a man of the cloth. They'll believe every word of it. Who would they believe more? If you're not gone by tonight, I'm going to tell them about you dealing from the bottom of the deck. I'm going to tell them about you killing that boy. I'm going to tell them about you and the girls. I'm going to tell them everything."

There was a moment more of silence, where I could see a fire raging inside him. I fought the urge to back up, to back away, to run from his unG.o.dly presence. I fought and won and held my ground, even as his body tensed, even as he brought the shovel back as if to land a great blow, even as that shovel rushed at me and past me and rang with a brutal clang on the steps of the altar behind me.

I turned around to glance at it lying there, at an oblique angle on the stairs, and when I turned back to Lawrence Cutlip, he was walking out the door.

And, all praises to G.o.d, I never saw him again.

43.

"SO THAT is the story, gentlemen," said the Reverend Henson, sitting behind his desk, his forefinger sliding back and forth across the bevel on the desktop's edge. "That is all I know. No facts underlay my accusations, no secret confessions, just a series of my own surmises. I knew nothing for certain. Had I known anything for certain, I would have done all in my power to put him in jail where he truly belonged, but I guessed well enough and knew enough about bluffing to banish this evil from our lives." is the story, gentlemen," said the Reverend Henson, sitting behind his desk, his forefinger sliding back and forth across the bevel on the desktop's edge. "That is all I know. No facts underlay my accusations, no secret confessions, just a series of my own surmises. I knew nothing for certain. Had I known anything for certain, I would have done all in my power to put him in jail where he truly belonged, but I guessed well enough and knew enough about bluffing to banish this evil from our lives."

"That was pretty d.a.m.n brave," I said. "He might just as easily have killed you."

"What else was I to do? And in the end, I supposed it all worked out well. Hailey did go to college, as you know, and to law school, too. She never confided in me in any way after that, treated me like a business acquaintance, which I suppose I had become. She simply took her money and went off into her new life, G.o.d bless her. Roylynn took a few courses at the community college, but that was all. There were three more attempts at suicide which halted her formal education, but she seems to be fighting the urge successfully, for now. The money from Pritchett has been used to finance a continuing series of rest homes, like the one she's in now. I visit her when I can, I myself gave her the physics book she clutches so fiercely. I thought it would be a diversion, but it has become something to her like a Bible, and I don't suppose that is so bad a thing. We all need something to believe in."

"I met with Roylynn after I spoke to you," I said.

"Yes, I heard. I had hoped you would honor my request, but she said nice things about you."

"She told me that something called a primordial black hole killed Jesse Sterrett and her sister, something from the beginning of time with the power to obliterate anything that comes close."

"Yes, I've heard her say that. It's hard to understand, but I think I have an explanation. I believe that what she calls a black hole is simply her expression for the evil I saw in her uncle. He left that night and never returned, and I only knew of his whereabouts through the occasional references from Roylynn, who learned what she knew from her sister. It was she who told me of the nursing home in Henderson, a place I called as soon as I heard about Hailey. No, he had never left the property, I made sure of that before ever you came upon the scene, Mr. Carl."

"If I need you to testify, Reverend, would you come up to Philadelphia?"

"I would, yes, but what could I say? What do I have for you, really, except my suspicions, and from what I can glean from the lawyer shows on TV, my suspicions are not much use in a legal case."

"What exactly are your suspicions, Reverend Henson?" asked Breger. "Do you really think he killed the Sterrett boy?"

"Yes, I do. I saw it in his eyes as he held that shovel, but I own not an ounce of proof."

"Why did he do it?"

"Jealousy."

"Of Hailey?"

"Of course."

"But why? What exactly do you suspect was going on between Cutlip and his nieces?"

"You ask for a surmise when I gave you all the facts at my disposal. I don't think you have a right to anything more than that, and I won't put my darkest fears about those girls into words. But she was a young girl in bad circ.u.mstances and terribly confused. Whatever it was that had infected her and that she was trying, in her way, to tell me about, it had nothing to do with love. It was something else, something monstrous and unG.o.dly. And if it survived his leaving this town, it did so in the dark recesses of a dark heart that never allowed itself to catch a glimpse of light."

OUTSIDE THE CHURCH, Breger I and took a slow walk in the graveyard. I weaved among the tombstones reading the now familiar names. Breger examined this stone, stared at this flower, this path, searched the cemetery as if it were a crime scene. While I stood among the graves, the harrowing lines of a dead poet rang in my ears. Breger I and took a slow walk in the graveyard. I weaved among the tombstones reading the now familiar names. Breger examined this stone, stared at this flower, this path, searched the cemetery as if it were a crime scene. While I stood among the graves, the harrowing lines of a dead poet rang in my ears.

"A white Camaro ran me down on a rocky road outside Henderson, Nevada," I said finally to Breger.

"I read the police report when I was out there."