Decatur (7 page)

“Ayutthaya,” she whispered, “The golden city.”

“In Ayutthaya,” Max repeated, opening his notebook, anticipation tightening his chest. He was sure the new institute’s founder Dr. Wendell, as an archeologist, would know about this golden city. But how did Marilyn know about it, he wondered, if it wasn’t a past life regression, she would have to be pretty well read, unless of course it was all fiction.

“I must be quiet, he’s out there now.” Marilyn’s voice had changed timbre and all the laughing notes were gone.

“He who pursues you?” Max used the phrase as she had used it in the previous session as Marilyn made the Buddhist hand mudra he had seen before, the Karana, used to cast out demons.

Khandar knew he should have told the master of his fears before it had come to this, him hiding in the temple, with one of his fellow novices crushed under Satta’s feet and all because the novice had questioned the demon disguised as an elephant trainer. It wasn’t an accident no matter what it looked like. Khandar knew. But the demon held him as if under a spell. There was a secret thrill to it that was nearly indescribable and made his limbs ache. The man in the map room wouldn’t understand how tempting it was to think yourself able to attract the attentions of one such as this. But for some reason he wanted to try to make the man understand, as he had failed so miserably in so many ways to honor his monastery.

“He came under the guise of being able to train elephants to do the most delicate maneuvers as well as prepare them for battle. It was a tradition before the Water Festival for our monastery to open our doors to anyone who wanted to be one with us and Buddha’s elephants. He filled so many of our needs as the fear of war with the Burmese was mounting every day and he was so confident and sure of his training that of course we wanted him to stay.” Max saw Marilyn shake her head, and lean forward, her face strained, but this was unlike any hypnotic session he had ever had. Could he be witnessing a full-blown past life regression unfold in front of him? In any case the person she was channeling wasn’t Marilyn.

There on the path, he moved like a tiger slipping between the shadows. He was hunting for him, the foolish novice, Khandar.
“But he quickly proved his worth to my master and the head of our monastery. He was a fighter, with a discipline and strength we never had seen before. He was humble, modest even, and cast himself as our monastery’s protector. Afraid of nothing not even death.” Marilyn’s voice was low and the words seemed to slip out of her lips in a stealthy way as if she was afraid of what she was saying.

Max nodded encouragingly. “What did he want?”

Marilyn sighed deeply and grimaced. “From the very beginning he seemed to single me out. Even when I began to suspect, I didn’t want to believe it.”
The female in the chair was his reincarnation from another realm, the young monk knew that, but he was still afraid for her, and himself. He wrapped his robe tightly around his slim body and crouched down on his haunches behind the stone altar where the day’s offerings lay in golden bowls.

Max watched as Marilyn tucked herself in a tight ball. “What didn’t you want to believe?” asked Max, wishing now he had a tape recorder.

“That I had seen him before. That I knew what he was.”
Khandar sucked in his breath sharply and exhaled the lion’s breath of a yogic breath cycle, to stop himself from running out onto the path to the stranger who had bewitched him. Just to get it over with. He was sure only his death would stop the monster. Khandar held his hands still in the mudra, hoping it would protect him. Would his pursuer would pass by the temple and go to their usual meeting spot by the elephant baths or would he sense him here?

“That he was a demon? You are making the Karana mudra,” Max prompted, his voice just a smidgen too excited. Rowley looked up curiously at Marilyn, cocking his head to one side as he considered his mistress. She didn’t smell quite right to him, he sniffed deeply. She was afraid inside somewhere and Rowley looked around the room for what the threat might be, steeling himself to make a move to defend her

“I was flattered at first that he even noticed one as lowly as myself, the novice monk Khandar. He would ride on the elephants around our grounds like a god but he would always insist that I lead him. He told me that I was part of something that had started a long time ago and that he needed me to complete things. He called me the source. He said I had something that he needed and I could lift a curse and make him more powerful than ever before. The other monks began to notice the changes in me but the demon that pursued me was relentless. I fear he is a perversion of nature.”
The man in the map room couldn’t help him now. The pursuer was getting closer and soon he would come into the temple and Khandar would be robbed of any future reincarnation and he would become less than a water beetle, he would not even have the divine matter of a stone. The pursuer was hunting his soul and would take it unless he found some way to escape. The thought exploded in his brain. Even as the woman sat in the chair he was scrambling underneath the altar. There was a secret door in the floor. He had heard the other monks whispering about it. It led to a passageway out of the city in case of an attack by the Burmese. As his hands grasped the lip of the stone that covered the entrance to the underground escape tunnel below, he was struck with a sense that something had been hidden beneath another altar in another time. But there was no time to think only time to move.

Marilyn stopped suddenly and put her hand over her heart. “I had to get away as I began to fear for more than my life,” breathed Marilyn, whose pupils widened and swallowed her irises as she staggered up from her chair, “Is he coming now?” A long wooden pointer rolled seemingly on its own accord out of its holder, spun once, and began to float across the room, as if held by an invisible hand. Rowley jumped down and began to bark wildly at the door. The pointer, Max noticed with a chill was vibrating in the middle of the map of the United States, dead center on Decatur, Illinois.

“It’s alright, Marilyn. It’s all going to be alright,” Max said, “You can wake up now and you won’t feel afraid. Wake up. Rowley, stop barking. No one’s there,” he said with more authority than he felt. Rowley whined and backed away from the door as Max helped Marilyn sit down and the pointer fell dumbly to the floor.

“I remembered something, didn’t I?” she asked groggily, glad that the Map Room had that warm library light and that Rowley was licking her hands and nuzzling her.

“I think you would admit you are carrying some kind of psychic burden. It seems like you have been carrying it forward from other lives. I think our work will be to lift that burden, Marilyn.” Max picked up the pointer that had flung itself out of its holder and used it to point to a red dot on the map of Siam marking the ruins of Ayutthaya.

“Okay, professor,” she said in her raspy whisper voice, “Something’s gotta give.”

CHAPTER TWELVE
Things that Come Back to Haunt

The hallway clock chimed four and the Monsignor perked up as the strains from the thrilling title sequence and theme song to the re-run of
The Big Valley
began to play on the living room television set. It always seemed to the priest that the episodes became racier all week until Friday and today was bound to be good as it was Wednesday. Mrs. Napoli always served canned cream of tomato soup with grilled cheese on Wednesday and that is what he had eaten for lunch. The Monsignor would never admit it, Notre Dame Graduate that he was, that he loved canned tomato soup and
The Big Valley
re-runs. It was Barbara Stanwyck playing Virginia Barkley, the tough beautiful widowed matriarch of the Barkley ranch that kept him and Mrs. Napoli watching every afternoon although the housekeeper had a marked soft spot for the illegitimate son, Heath. The old priest would watch the show in a crafty way with a copy of the Catholic Digest open in his lap while Mrs. Napoli would crane through the open kitchen to see the set as she made Jell-O fruit salad, another Wednesday dinner staple. Before he was semi- retired the Monsignor rarely had time to watch to watch the big western show in prime time so now he relished every episode in re-runs.

The old Monsignor felt a little flutter of surprise as Gar, smudged with gardening dirt, came in and with a quick smile said, “Oh, boy, this is one of my favorite shows, mind if I watch with you?” Then the parish guest plunked himself down on the carpet like a big kid and turned all rapt attention to the television set. Mrs. Napoli caught the eye of the old priest and shrugged as if to say,
well, at least he has good taste
.

The episode was a corker involving stolen cattle, a Mexican bandit, and a mysterious rancher who seemed to have an eye on Virginia Barkley’s daughter Audra. The Monsignor drifted off into a daydream of being the padre at an adobe church near the ranch with a big bell that would sound out over the fields calling Virginia Barkley to mass.

“Gar, will you put the pork chops and baked beans in at five thirty? They’re all ready to go,” said Mrs. Napoli as she put her apron back in the broom closet preparing to leave.

“You bet, Mrs. Napoli, you know anything I can do to help makes me happy,” Gar said.

The exchange shook the Monsignor out of his daydream. The morning came back to him, Father Weston and the newspaper story, Father Troy’s stubborn face. Monsignor Lowell hated it when priests squabbled, they were worse than old biddies. Over Father Weston’s objections he had sent them on their usual Wednesday rounds. Father Weston taught
The Catholic Faith, Now and Forever
at the Catholic high school to seniors and Father Troy played his guitar and visited the St. Joe’s nursing home just a few blocks away from St. Pat’s. Some of the residents objected to “the hippie priest,” the Monsignor knew, but what with the way priests were leaving the orders and fewer than ever were coming in the St. Joe’s residents were lucky to have an ordained priest visiting them at all. Then both Father Troy and Father Weston did rounds at St. Mary’s hospital, visiting the sick and giving the holy sacraments until they came back sometime around six for dinner. Sometimes they rode together in Father Weston’s navy blue Oldsmobile but more often than not Father Troy would take the city bus so he could ‘be with the people’ as he liked to say. The Monsignor had promised to think over whether or not Gar should be allowed to stay but the whole thing seemed fuzzy to him. There had to be things they weren’t telling him but he wasn’t sure he wanted to know whatever it was they were.

The five o’clock news began to play on the television set. The old priest got up, making sure that Mrs. Napoli had left for the day and, with a little wink at Gar, took a key from inside his black frock pocket and opened up the liquor cabinet. With his high blood pressure and heart condition the Monsignor was forbidden alcohol by the interfering Dr. Jordan, but the Monsignor liked his sherry and, taking a bottle from the stock, he poured with shaky hands a tumbler full. He paused, unsure whether he should offer Gar anything but Gar solved it for him by saying, “Oh, I don’t care for the stuff.” Then, carefully locking the cabinet back up, the Monsignor eased back to his recliner, careful not to spill a drop.

The handsome but fleshy T.V. anchorman with the beige sport coat on leaned over the news desk dramatically. “Breaking news, Decaturites, Channel 9 has learned that a third body has been found on the grounds of the Lincoln Log Motel where earlier this week two traveling carnies were killed in a drug deal gone wrong. Is Decatur in the middle of a Chicago-style drug war? Authorities are looking to the public for any tips about this case. Full story at six.” The set filled with a seedy image of the backside of the motel with its abandoned ice-cream cart, patio furniture, and the broken down log cabin playhouse. The Monsignor was so transfixed that he didn’t notice that Gar had gotten up from his seat on the brown carpeted floor. When he looked up he was startled for a moment at just how physically imposing Gar seemed.

“I need to talk to you, Monsignor Lowell, I hope you don’t mind,” Gar said in his respectful way but he turned and shut the news off with a click of the set’s knob without even asking.

Too bad, Gar thought as he shut off the news. Collateral damage, it happened. The guy shouldn’t have come looking for drugs from his friends the carnies and then he shouldn’t have tried to run. The guy was fair prey. As a vampire Gar had to feed and he was already in for a penny, in for a pound at the old Lincoln Log motel. He had stuffed him in the log cabin playhouse before he peddled away that night.

Monsignor Lowell gnawed his lip a little in irritation at the insolence of Gar shutting off the five o’clock news, but saying nothing took a sip of sherry. The tawny wine rolled around his mouth with its marvelous taste of sweet and bitter. “Sit down, my son. We’ll talk. Are you worried about the two carnies who were murdered?”

“They didn’t work for me but it does make you feel awful.” Gar gave a crooked smile and sat as though it was perfectly natural, Indian-style, at the Monsignor’s feet looking again to the priest more like a boy than a man.

“Father Weston’s concerned there might be gossip if you stay,” said the old priest slowly, taking another sip of sherry.

“We don’t need to talk about fruitless worries like that, Monsignor. We can communicate about deeper things. You had an experience once, with someone, very special. It’s marked you in a way. I can tell. I’ve wanted to talk to you about this ever since I arrived. I’ve been waiting for the right moment. I can’t leave unless you tell me what I need to know. You touched someone’s essence didn’t you, once? You knew it. It was unmistakable: this soul, that vibrant thrumming feeling of it, the invisible web-like texture. So precious and so rare.” Gar was breathing heavily and his tongue licked his lips in a hungry way.

The Monsignor didn’t notice because, after a shock of recognition, long buried images from the past flooded his mind. Gar reached up and took the old man’s nearly translucent hand in the most tender way, massaging his bony knuckles as the priest’s faded blue eyes blinked back tears.

“I understand you see, father, dear. Tell me everything,” said Gar softly and suddenly the Monsignor was overcome with the desire to finally talk about the episode nearly thirty years ago with a little girl parishioner named Marilyn Newcomb and her widowed mother, Annabelle. He had tried before with Father Weston some five or six years ago when the priest had first come to the parish and had taken an interest in Marilyn, but he couldn’t get it out. Monsignor Lowell had carried a deep shame within himself about what had happened, so that Gar’s compassionate manner was like manna from heaven. Oh, to die and be free of the tortures of doubt, thought the Monsignor as he knocked back the entire tumbler of sherry to give himself courage to speak.

“Annabelle Newcomb was a young widow; her husband was killed in the war. She became a housekeeper for a locally prominent family. Now, they weren’t Catholics. And there was some talk about her employer’s curious habits. Then his young wife committed suicide. It surely wasn’t an ideal situation but as a widow Annabelle needed the work. She lived simply, with her daughter Marilyn who went to school here. When Marilyn was in fourth grade, she was accused of stealing from the man Annabelle worked for. A terrible fuss, what if Annabelle lost her position? She was worried sick. Nothing was ever proved as I remember and little Marilyn never confessed, at least not to me. But then Annabelle began to tell me that she believed her daughter to be possessed of the devil. For months I tried to talk Annabelle out of it. But she kept telling me about how the child had nightmares. But what was more troubling, Annabelle insisted Marilyn would have spells at home where, if she became upset objects would go flying across the room. By themselves. Little Marilyn with the big dark eyes and long black hair was an odd little girl who the nuns said had a hard time making friends. I think the other children may have made fun of her. I seem to remember one of the sisters talking about what a shame it was because Marilyn was so bright, brighter than anyone she had ever taught. I didn’t want to believe Annabelle but finally I made a visit to their home. A modest little duplex on North Street, a mile or so west of here.

“It was after supper on a Friday night in Lent. They lived on the upper floor and I brought with me a white taper candle, my prayer book, silver crucifix, and a wand in the shape of a rattle filled with holy water. Annabelle Newcomb hadn’t convinced me but I thought I would be prepared. In their small living room I lit the candle and suggested we kneel and say prayers. The little girl looked at me, no, looked through me. I can never forget those eyes, they seemed ancient, no child has eyes like that. I kissed the silver crucifix and gave it to Annabelle who also kissed Jesus’ feet. But as she gave it to her kneeling daughter, the crucifix spun out of her hand and began to travel in mid air across the room. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes. I wanted to get up and grab it but I felt momentarily pinned to the floor as if my knees had been frozen in place. The crucifix spun in three slow circles, suspended in midair when little Marilyn got up and took it in her hands and gave it back to me. I took it from her and placed it on her forehead. I shook the rattle of holy water over her and began saying the prayer of exorcism over her with her mother weeping in the background. But instead of withering or moaning or writhing like one with a demon inside, the little girl just knelt there, tears shining in those ancient eyes. The most powerful shame began to steal over me and I stumbled on the prayer. This girl wasn’t evil. I reached out to touch her and that’s when I felt it, just for a second, but a second I will never forget, the cosmos was not more glorious than this tiny fraction of time when I reached out and felt her living soul.”

The Monsignor shut his eyes for a long moment, back in the apartment thirty years ago. The terrible mistake he had made of thinking the girl haunted him from that time on, with the stories of martyrs more real to him than ever before. He became a much more humble man after that Friday in Lent. It became the quality in him that people talked about the most, his humble ways, when in fact up until that time he had been just another arrogant priest more interested in brown-nosing the bishop than anything spiritual. As for Annabelle, she stopped coming to mass regularly and switched Marilyn to the cheaper public school. The incident was never talked about again and the priest tried not to worry about the dark haired girl in the increasingly rough neighborhood she lived in.

“You make me so jealous,” said Gar ruefully. The remark startled the Monsignor out of his reverie. What was there to be jealous about, he wondered? Gar squeezed his hand then. “Tell me, does Marilyn still live on North Street about a mile west of here?” Gar didn’t have to ask if she still lived in Decatur, he knew that, he had known that since he had jumped from the train. The old man nodded as a quivering thread of anxiety seemed to sprout out of his heart. The sherry was hitting him hard, he thought.

“You must have followed her at least from a distance over the years. Where does she work in town? Or is the source married now?” asked Gar, leaning in too close.

The priest wanted to push him away but suddenly felt afraid of the big man, and
why was he calling Marilyn the source?
It was unnerving, but Gar just kept staring at him as if willing him to talk. “You’re going to tell me, father.”

“She’s a waitress at the Surrey. It was the failure of the public school that she never went on to something. Lived with her mother until Annabelle died.” The words slipped out of the Monsignor’s lips as the anxiety began to throb in all of his veins and make its way to the base of his skull where it began to pop in bright little bursts that flooded behind his eyes. “Don’t hurt her,” was the last coherent thing the old priest said.