Solomon's Grave (28 page)

As for his kids, fatherhood was never big on his list of goals. It was fun while it lasted, but now that he was free, Melissa could keep the headaches. Maybe if grandchildren came into the picture a decade or two from now, he might show his face again. He heard it was a lot less work with grandchildren.

Enter Peter Quinn, during one of Manny’s rare purchases of beer at
The Greedy Grocer
. He never had been much of a drinker, preferring to avoid any habit that might suck more coins from the bare cupboard his bank account had become. Still, now and then he’d splurge on a twelve pack of Bud and rent a couple of movies.

His first assumption when Quinn caught up with him outside the store was that the guy was homosexual and hitting on him. Manny had excused himself and headed for his car, but Quinn followed. He asked if Manny needed a job. Steady work, not very difficult, and the pay was good.

Sounded too good to be true. But Quinn hadn’t been lying. The work was easy, and the pay was twice anything he’d ever collected before. Everything was under the table, to boot. Nothing for Uncle Sam, or Melissa, to lay claim to. All Manny had to do was not smirk when Quinn started chanting to the devil or talking about some kind of
valuable prizes
buried in town. The guy was seriously nuts, no question about that. But he must be rich, connected with the mob or something, since the cash every week was real. The money had to come from somewhere. Quinn was always calling someone in Chicago. He was more likely connected with the mafia than a three thousand year old cult. Quinn and his goons were on some modern day treasure hunt, no more, no less.

Didn’t matter to him. As long as they kept paying and he didn’t wake up some day with a horse’s head in his bed, he was more than happy to sit in the woods and stare monotonously at some dark house all night. The vigil wouldn’t be half as hard, though, if he could read something. The boss had been very specific about no lights, and Quinn had an uncanny way of knowing when he was being lied to. So, Manny simply sat in his car, now and then pouring more coffee from his thermos when he felt his eyes closing for too long. Like they were beginning to do now.

His phone vibrated against his hip.
Thank God
, he thought.
A distraction
.

He pulled the cell from its holster. “Manny Paulson.”

Quinn’s voice was barely audible, so quietly was he whispering. “Where are you, Paulson?”

“The usual spot. Nothing to report.”

A pause, then, “Obviously. However, Tarretti, Reverend Dinneck and his girlfriend are here at the cemetery on Greenwood Street, you blind, useless....” He stopped, let his breath out slowly before continuing. “Get over here, now, but be quiet about it. Do you remember where the grave is?”

“Pretty sure, yeah. And listen, I swear I didn’t see—”

But the call had already been disconnected. Manny cursed and started the car.

*     *     *

Peter pocketed the phone, then lifted the gun in the handkerchief. It was a clip-fed nine millimeter, the same type carried by Vincent Tarretti, though Peter didn’t know this fact. The rounds were small but effective.

“Mister Everson.”

Josh looked at him. “Yes?”

Making sure the safety was thumbed to the “on” position, at least until he could see how the kid handled it, he handed him the weapon. He would be sure the safety was off before he sent the boy into the grave. “Take this and follow me. I have something I need you to do. Very important, and you will want to do this very much.” He rose; the young man did likewise. Peter picked up the battery-powered lantern they had brought with them from the car, but left it dark.

He led Everson out of the woods, making sure to keep him slightly to the side as they walked toward the gravesite, in case he tripped. Safety or not, he didn’t want to risk being shot in the back. As they came closer, the voices, which had faded away once the trio had dropped from sight, came back to him, along with an occasional blink of the flashlight. Peter removed the black cap and tucked it into his back pocket, then worked his fingers through his hair, putting it back into some sense of order.

He forced himself to breathe steadily, clearing his mind. So close, but not there yet. In whispers, he used the Voice to instruct Josh Everson what he must do.

Chapter Fifty-Two

The whole room was barely twice as large as the area in which the three of them currently stood. There were no furnishings save one significant slab of concrete raised a few feet from the floor, with matching slabs acting as supports. The setup reminded Elizabeth uncomfortably of an altar. Most of the room lay under the base of the angelic statues. On either side of the concrete altar, from floor to ceiling, rose two cylindrical supports like she had in her own basement.

What drew everyone’s attention, however, was what sat on top of the slab.

In the beam of her flashlight, the gold trim of the Ark glittered as if freshly washed. The dust that permeated every corner of the room seemed not to touch it. It was a chest with elaborate gold designs of multi-faced figures staring out from the ornate sides. The lid was trimmed with more gold along its edges, but was simple in its design. She remembered again the memory of the chest in Gram’s attic. The entire vessel was no more than a yard wide, rectangular, much smaller than the images she’d seen once or twice in pictures from her old Sunday school books. She thought there should have been something atop the lid, statuary or some such decoration. The word “seat” came to mind but she wasn’t certain why. Overall, the structure seemed too small. Something occurred to her, then. She wasn’t sure what that
something
was, but the Ark’s size and details no longer seemed wrong. It was just, well, different than she’d imagined.

The gold reflected more light than could have come from her flashlight. Even so, when she lowered the light experimentally, no additional glow emanated from that side of the room. She scratched the back of her neck with her free hand. The air felt...
itchy
. Like it was filled with static electricity.

Knock it off
, she thought, trying to regain her composure.
It’s just a fancy box. Nothing more
.

Nate, however, must have thought otherwise. He slowly fell to one knee, with an expression of wonder and awe. He said, “How can this be? How can this possibly be?”

Tarretti shrugged. “It’s God’s will that the Covenant not fall into the hands of anyone but His followers. It’s been a long race, a long struggle. We cannot understand the why of it, except for the reasons I’ve already explained. More than that, we’ll never know. Not until we’re with Him in paradise. Someday you can read some of my translations of earlier caretakers’ theories, I guess. There are references to the Ark of the Covenant in the book of Revelations, but in those, it appeared within the glory of heaven. Nothing earth-bound.

“But the adversary is close, and its time for the treasure to leave this place.”

Elizabeth turned the flashlight onto the caretaker’s face. Vincent squinted and raised one hand to block the light. She said, “What exactly do you want with Nate? If you want to take this thing away somewhere, just take it.”

 “Please take that light out of my face.” When she didn’t, he sighed and nodded in the direction of the altar. “I’ve already explained that only an ordained priest of God can transport the Ark.” He looked at Nate. “You know what I’m saying is the truth, Reverend.”

Nate rose up. One knee was caked in dust. Tarretti was somehow enchanting him, playing on his faith in order to manipulate him. She aimed the light back at the box. “This is getting ridiculous. What’s inside that thing? And don’t tell me the ten commandments or I’ll hit you with this flashlight.”

She walked up to the altar and reached out. Tarretti tackled her from the side, arms around her waist. She felt something else as well, but before she could think much about it she was in the dust with Tarretti on top of her and already struggling to his feet. The flashlight had rolled to the corner of the room.

“Don’t,” he said, almost pleading, trying to catch his breath and move away from her at the same time. “If you touch it, you’ll die!”

Chapter Fifty-Three

Nathan ran to Elizabeth and took her arm, helped her up. Tarretti’s sudden move had broken the reverential spell he had fallen into when he saw the Ark. It looked much smaller than he’d expected, but the shape, the detailed gilding along its face and lid, was very much like what he had envisioned. His mood had shifted decidedly at seeing Elizabeth attacked, however, and for the moment, he let himself forget everything else except his own anger.

He turned toward Tarretti’s rising form. “Keep your hands off her, Mr. Tarretti. Maybe what you’re saying is true, but if you do something like that again, so help me—”

Vincent raised his hands. “I apologize, but you know the Bible, Reverend. You know what happens to anyone who touches this vessel.”

Nathan
did
understand. There were incidents in the Old Testament of people reaching out for the Ark only to fall instantly dead. Many scholars theorized that perhaps the structure was built such that it was hyperconductive to electricity, a battery of sorts built before such a thing was ever conceived of. Nathan never bought into that idea. Batteries didn’t win wars.

But something in how Tarretti said it made Nathan think, for the first time that night, that the man was lying. In some way. He looked back at the gold-laden chest.

“Is that why you need me? I’m supposed to be the only one who can touch it, is that it?”

A dust-covered Elizabeth walked to the corner and retrieved the flashlight. When she returned, she moved it alternately between the Ark and Tarretti. “Maybe you should try Saint Malachy’s across town.”

“Elizabeth, please,” Nathan said, letting impatience slip into his tone. He pointed to the table. “Where do you think I’m supposed to take this? I have a ministry to support. People need me here, not hiding in some graveyard in Kansas or Missouri.”

Vincent brushed dust off his sleeve and said, almost sadly, “God will lead you to the best place. This is your ministry now, Reverend. He will take care of your old flock somehow.”

Nathan swallowed. The dust was beginning to make him choke. He couldn’t accept this; even now, he needed to be certain. “Like Elizabeth said, is what’s inside there the tablets of the ten commandments? The actual ones Moses brought down from the mountain?” He thought, perhaps hoped, saying this out loud would sound ludicrous. It didn’t, not to him, not at this moment. Perhaps God was putting this acceptance in his heart. Or maybe he was just tired of fighting. Time to just go mad himself and live out the delusion.

Tarretti moved toward the altar, but did not touch it. Elizabeth shined the light into the center of his jacket. “I thought I felt something when you landed on me. What’s in your front coat pocket, Tarretti?”

Vincent put a hand to the front of his windbreaker and sighed, like a man who’d just eaten something that did not agree with him. “It’s a gun, Miss O’Brien.”

Nathan and Elizabeth stiffened.

“Please,” he continued. “I’m not going to shoot you. I didn’t think you’d like the fact that I came here armed. Believe me, it is purely for our protection.” He turned toward Nathan. “Reverend, I feel strongly that our time is running out, and I need to tell you one more thing.”

A light thump behind them was followed by a man’s voice. “Please do not move, or I will be forced to shoot you.”

The words were spoken in a monotone, like a person learning lines in a play. The shock of the new arrival was so surprising no one moved, except to shift themselves on the dusty floor to look back toward the ladder.

Before Elizabeth’s flashlight beam landed across him, Nathan knew who that voice belonged to. Josh Everson stood at the base of the ladder, a small black gun in his hand. He held it with a steady assurance, though Nathan could not remember his friend ever holding one before.

Josh stared with sorrowful eyes, almost the look of a sleepwalker. He raised the gun toward Elizabeth. “Move the light away now, please.” His voice grew in urgency as he said this. Everyone in the room came to the same conclusion. He was preparing to shoot someone. Elizabeth lowered the flashlight to a spot on the floor between her and Nathan. Josh stood no more than five feet from him, but to Nathan, it seemed a hundred miles. This couldn’t be Josh. It was too much to accept that he was involved in this.

Then again, he hadn’t known about Josh and Elizabeth’s relationship either. He hadn’t known this... thing... was buried in his home town. No, his best friend was not about to shoot Elizabeth.

“Josh,” he said, almost sadly. Josh moved his head toward him in a jerking motion. Nathan continued, “Josh, what’s going on? It’s me, Nate. And Elizabeth.”

Josh’s head did a robot turn toward her. No recognition, in what expression could be seen in the dust covered light.

There was a sudden
scrunch!
from across the small room. Vincent had opened the front of his jacket and was reaching inside.

Josh aimed his gun at the caretaker’s chest and did not hesitate when he pulled the trigger. The room exploded with sound and one bright, blue-white flash. Nathan put his hands to his ears, feeling pain in his head from the shot’s reverberation. Elizabeth reached out and pulled him to the floor.

Josh did not fire the gun again.

Elizabeth whispered, “Vincent?” The fact that she used his first name, and in such a tentative way, filled Nathan with a terrible premonition. In the suddenness of what had just happened, the fact that Josh had shot the man hadn’t registered until now. He added his own, “Tarretti? Vince, you OK?” He wanted to ask Josh why he’d done it, but now he didn’t want to draw his friend’s attention their way.

Elizabeth shined the flashlight toward where the caretaker had been standing.

Vincent Tarretti slid along the wall, the jacket bunching up against his back. His hands were pressed against his stomach, just above the oversized pocket. Blood spilled though his fingers. He moaned once, landing in a spread-eagle sitting position.