Page 59 of Go Home
SHALL BE THE LAST
TWO BECOME ONE
IN PERFECT SACRIFICE
Golgotha.Denton’s last word, apparently, according to the warden at the prison.And venue for the last words of Christ.A site just outside the walls of Jerusalem, the name from the Hebrew,gullet.Skull.If Denton meant that the prison in Pennsylvania was Golgotha – which would certainly have tied in with the man’s narcissistic fantasies about being some kind of dark messiah – then was that the “first” Golgotha?
And if it was, then where was the last?
Two become one.She found herself thinking about the story she’d discussed with Gabe.What strange relationships must have developed, between the Navajo Code Talkers, and the men charged both with guarding them and, possibly, killing them, if circumstances demanded.The St.Jude’s Club.
It was as if a switch had been flicked.She sensed her own thoughts gliding, like ice-skaters or synchronized swimmers, gliding balletically into a precise formation, order where there had been a mess, precision where there was confusion.The translation of the code was only one stage.There was a meta-message, a message on top of the others.It made perfect sense.She knew where the last Golgotha was.She knew where she needed to go.
She picked up her phone.Marcus answered after a couple of rings.There was music, shouting.
“How well do you know Walterville?”
“Hold on.”
He moved somewhere quieter.His tone of voice changed, too.
“I know it a little, Kate.What’s happening?”
“I need you to meet me.At the church of St.Simon and St.Jude’s.”
“Kate, Winters said –”
“Winters isn’t going to know.”
“She-”
“Isn’t going to find out, is she?Back me, Marcus, please.I need you.”
There was a pause.He sighed loudly.“You got me.”
She hung up before he could say anything else.There were many mysteries surrounding that hot, airless August evening, thirteen years ago.The person who shot Kate’s father multiple times with an assault rifle, had never been found, although due to his stem cell research, there were plenty of contenders at the fringes of Christian fundamentalism, and plenty who made a point of celebrating his death.
Nor was it clear why her father – a sworn atheist – should have visited the Church of St.Simon and St.Jude’s on the night in question.It wasn’t close to his home, or any of his workplaces; there were no links between her father and the priest, or with any members of the congregation.Footprints at the scene suggested the killer had hidden in a bush, smoking one cigarette after another, as they waited for Dr.Valentine to emerge from the church building.Had they followed him there?Or had they lured him to that spot?Who was her father expecting to meet?
Kate had spent years of her life asking questions like these.Years wondering.Years playing out different, fantasy outcomes.That a detective would call her up, announce that they’d got a perfect DNA match, that some hitherto-mislaid scrap of evidence had come to light, that someone facing life without parole had grown a conscience, wanted to get something off his chest… She tried not to play games like that with herself, but it was hard.She had to have hope, after all.
Could the killer of Father Thomas, Professor Whitman, and Leonard Palmer also be the killer of her father?Was he just playing games with her?Or could he actually unlock the mystery that had shaped her life?
CHAPTER TWENTY
“St.Simon and St.Jude.So good they named it twice,” Marcus quipped.
The church might have had two saintly benefactors, but it was a wreck of a place.Over the past thirteen years, it had been occupied by junkies, tagged by graffiti artists, set alight, boarded up, and bust apart on multiple occasions, in the meantime being stripped of a good proportion of its constituent building materials.
The surrounding area seemed to have declined in sympathy; a nearby housing project bore the unfortunate honor of being Maine’s worst, and the liquor store had the look of a heavily fortified bunker.Kate and Marcus parked underneath a faltering streetlight, watched, carefully, by a couple of young men who were just boys, really, in huge coats, on the opposite side of the road.
“Talk about Lost Causes,” Marcus went on, philosophically.“Are you sure you want to do this?”
“No,” Kate replied.“But let’s do it anyway.”
“Well, I got your back,” Marcus said.“But I don’t like the whole ‘perfect sacrifice’ angle.That doesn’t sound like it’s going anywhere nice.”
“Let me see that photo.”
