Name of the Devil (13 page)

“
A
SIN IS
like a scratch on your soul,” proclaims Reverend Groom. In his mid-forties, his head of dark hair is coiffed like that of a television anchorman. Dressed in a casual collared shirt and slacks, he doesn't look like a man of the cloth. He could be a well-groomed school principal, or your next-door neighbor dressed up for a block party.

There's something desperate in his voice as he leans on the lectern and tries to make eye contact with the viewers on the other side of the screen. I've seen that pleading look in the interrogation room from someone who wants to explain how he or she ended up in that horrible situation. Desperate to be believed. Guilty.

“If you ignore that sin, the wound gets wider. We do things to ignore the pain. We medicate ourselves. We deny it's even there. Maybe others don't know about it. Maybe they can see the effect. But you know. The wound grows.

“If we don't treat the wound, we die with the wound. We die imperfect. God looks down on our broken souls and says there's no place in heaven for us. Had we found the courage, we could have healed the wound, but we chose not to.

“But that's not the worst part. A wounded soul is an invitation. An opportunity for infection. That sin calls out to evil, and sometimes the evil answers. When we let the evil in, it makes us
commit more sin. Sometimes evil takes over. It's too late then. There's nothing left to do.”

He closes his eyes for a moment, then says, “I have sinned. My wounds are beyond repair. My soul is broken. In my weakness, I have let evil come into me. Even now it's making me do things I'm powerless to stop.

“I have become that evil. For I am Azazel. I walk the dark path. I live in the shadows.”

Reverend Groom opens his eyes and looks out into the studio while reaching under the lectern. He pulls out a revolver and places the barrel in his mouth. A shocked tech runs onto the set to try to get the gun away, but Groom pulls the trigger before the man can wrestle it from him. Red sprays from the back of his head, hitting the stained-glass window behind him. Drops of blood and brain fall on the floral decorations lining the set.

Groom's body slackens. He collapses onto the lectern, a smoke trail rising from the hole in his head in high-definition video.

Somewhere in the control room a technician finally has the sense to throw the live feed to a standby image of the station logo.

We sit in silence for a moment in the bullpen. Gerald finally speaks up as the recording stops. “I just looked him up. He lived near Hawkton about twenty years ago.”

“Did he know the people in the church?” asks Ailes.

“It's a safe bet. It's a small town,” Gerald replies.

“Tragic.”

“Why ‘Azazel'?” I ask. “We haven't released it yet.”

Gerald shrugs. “Details like that can leak.”

“Where was this recorded?”

“A studio near Atlanta.”

I turn to Ailes. “I'd like to go there.”

He hesitates, then shakes his head. “It's a suicide, Blackwood. There's no apparent connection to the murders.”

“There's a connection to the victims. Maybe.”

“I don't know. Breyer wants you off the case.”

“He said
Hawkton
. This isn't Hawkton and if it is a suicide, then it's not part of the case . . .”

Ailes rolls his eyes. “Another damn lawyer is all we need around here. If I say ‘yes,' what do you expect to find?”

“A connection to the murders.” I can feel it more than I can describe it.

“What kind of connection?”

“I don't think it was a suicide,” I reply, without any idea how I can back it up. Sometimes the pattern recognizes you before you recognize it.

“Pardon me?”

“I think someone made him do it.” Something about the video just reads wrong to me. I try to figure out what.

“Azazel?” Gerald raises an eyebrow.

I have to talk it through aloud, just to hear myself think. “Of course not. It's just . . . there's something about him that seems off. And I don't just mean because he's obviously flipping out. He almost seems coached. Roll it back. Pay attention to his eyes.”

We watch the recording again. As Groom speaks, his eyes start darting from the camera off to the side in an unprofessional way. Like he's distracted I pause the video mid-glance. “See that? It's like he's looking for someone.”

“Someone to stop him?” asks Ailes. I've got his attention now.

“No. I'm trying to think of an example. You know those hidden camera shows? Ever notice how people react when they find themselves in the middle of a really weird situation? It's that look.”

“I'm not sure I understand. Did he think he was in the middle of a joke?”

“I don't know. Maybe he wanted someone to intervene? Or what if he didn't think the gun was loaded?”

“This sounds a little dinner-theatre-murder-mystery to me,”
Ailes replies. “Someone there knew he was going to use the gun as a prop and put a real bullet in it?”

“I don't know. But already we have a hypothetical situation in which Groom's death wasn't a suicide, or at the very least influenced by someone else.”

“Maybe . . .”

“If it was a suicide, he was obviously distraught. In any event, he probably knew our church victims. The Azazel connection ties this to them. That alone should tell us there's something they shared. Something that killed them and made a man kill himself in the middle of a live broadcast.”

“Do you mean the sin he was talking about?”

“Yes. Don't you want to know what he did that was so horrible he felt he had to risk God's wrath by blowing his brains out in public? Something you kill yourself over might be something someone else would murder for. So what was their sin?”

“Their sin?” asks Ailes.

“The Hawkton victims. They're all being punished. That's the connection I was trying to put my finger on before. The church murders were retribution. I think Groom's suicide may have been instigated by someone else.”

“Where do you see the sheriff in all of this?”

“He's part of what happened. We know there was a sixth man at the Hawkton scene, but I don't think he's the sheriff's accomplice. I think he was the one putting things into motion.

“What we need to know now is whether there was someone whispering something in Groom's ear. Was he being pushed? And if we can link this to Tixato, that would also tell us there's something more here.”

“What?”

“I don't know. Groom's death came out of nowhere. We already talked about how revenge killings continue.” I think this over for a moment. “Is someone else next?”

T
HE WOMAN WHO
opened the front door smelled like a perfume counter. That overwhelming scent is my strongest memory of Julia Vender. Dressed in a bright silver evening gown and draped in more costume diamonds than there were crown jewels in all the kingdoms, she exuded a calculated, over-the-top opulence. From the bright smile with which she greeted us and the way she kissed him after calling out, “Petey!
Dahhhling
!” I thought she had to be a friend of Grandfather's.

Grandfather grumbled a response through his gritted teeth. I would learn later on that Vender was, in a sense, his arch nemesis. A celebrity psychic to the stars, she and he had faced off more than once on a television interview couch: Grandfather as the crusty skeptic, and Julia as the effervescent charmer swatting aside his comments about her being a charlatan.

“Dahhhling, my clients have more money than they know what to do with,” she'd say with a smile to the audience at home.

After the showdown, Grandfather would drive back from the studio hoping the appearance might get him another Atlantic City booking and put butts in seats. She'd count the money flooding into her 1-900 line.

Grandfather had watched her con her way into the lives of anyone important in Hollywood. Having spent years using magic to entertain, he was frustrated to see her manipulate its methods
to scam people out of their money. But it wasn't really the lavish gifts given to her by brain-dead celebrities that bothered him. It was knowing that, every time she appeared on a talk show, thousands of vulnerable, desperate people would call her pay line or buy her books with money they couldn't really spare. The live readings, or “demonstrations,” she held in major cities, where people who really couldn't afford it would pay five hundred dollars for the chance to ask her a question in a crowded room and maybe hear that yes, a departed relative still loved them, were the worst.

A con-artist extraordinaire, Julia Vender was also the most connected woman in Hollywood. From the struggling actress just off the bus from Nebraska to the studio chief who could make or break someone in a pen stroke, she knew everyone. Grief, pain and desire are universal.

Julia turned away from Grandfather and gazed down at me, broadly smiling. “Aren't you the most adorable creature!”

Too afraid to leave me alone at the house after the Buick incident, Grandfather and Dad had brought me along tonight. I'd followed them inside to endure Julia's embrace, and then sat quietly in a chair that looked to me as old as the pyramids, pretending to read a book while I listened.

“I was delighted when you called!” she effused. “I wish I saw more of you socially, Peter. I always think our banter makes for so much fun!”

“Yes, our encounters are lively,” replied Grandfather stiffly, trying to avoid a confrontation.

“So what is it that Peter Blackstar the Magnificent needs from Julia the Merely Interesting?” She grabbed his hand and slowly turned it palm up. “Come for a reading?”

Grandfather jerked his hand away. “Not quite.”

“What are you afraid of?”

“Contagious charlatanism,” he muttered. Dad gave him a nervous glance.

Julia's loud laugh nearly shook the chandeliers. “Oh my, Petey. You have such a wit. Why waste your time with the magic baubles? I think you missed your true calling.”

“Perhaps.” I could tell coming to her had been very difficult for him, and she knew it. She was reveling in the moment that was, for him, a humiliation.

“Seriously then, what can I do for you? Or is this to be the first of many friendly visits?”

Grandfather ignored her last comment, folded his hands under his arms, and stared at the floor. “I know we have our . . . professional differences . . .”

“What was it you said on
Merv Griffin
? Oh, yes, you accused me of being a fraud and a cheat, I recall. You said I fleece the innocent. You must know that my lawyers are always after me to take you to court. But I say, ‘No, leave poor Peter alone.' What would be in it, anyway?” Her eyes narrowed as her tone changed. “A ramshackle house? Some moth-eaten magic things. No, Peter, I don't let those things get to me. I'm better than that.”

“Better than that?” asked Grandfather, his voice rising.

Dad shot him another look from across the room, and Grandfather tried to regain his composure.

“We have very different ways of looking at things,” he finally said, in his most diplomatic manner. “I can be blunt . . . I don't think you're an evil person.”

“That's a relief! Especially coming from a man whose posters depict him with devilish imps sitting on his shoulders.”

Grandfather shook his head, barely controlling his anger. I could tell he was on the verge of giving up, but then he glanced toward me in the corner. His face softened. “I won't pretend I don't like what you do. But . . . I know there's a good side to you.”

“Likewise,” she replied halfheartedly. “But you're not here to mend fences. You're certainly not asking for a loan. Are you? Oh, how I'd love that.”

Grandfather bit his tongue. “They're threatening Jessica.”

Julia's face slackened. She turned to me, then back to Grandfather. “Who?”

“Brutani's outfit. It's complicated.”

“With him, I would imagine it is. Whyever would he hurt that precious little girl?”

“Because of me.” Dad spoke up for the first time. “He invested in a show that fell apart. He wants his money back and we don't have it right now.”

“Oh, dear.” Julia seemed sincere for the first time since she'd greeted us at the door. She smiled sadly at me. “Do you need money?”

“No!” Grandfather replied sharply. “We'll settle that ourselves. We just need some time, a way to talk to his people before things get out of hand. When Brutani's kid came out here he didn't say it was mob money he was loaning us, or we never would have touched it. Now we're in this pickle. I was hoping you might know somebody. Someone we could talk to.”

“Someone who Brutani answers to?”

“Yes. Maybe help us set up a meeting.”

“He's East Coast. I don't really know anyone out there. I don't run with those types anyway.”

“You don't have anything?” Grandfather pleaded.

Over the edge of my book I watched Julia's face soften. She could tell how hard it was for him to ask this. She also keenly understood the value of a favor. “Maybe . . .” she replied, with her finger in the air. “I have a friend who might know something. Sometimes we exchange information about clients.”

Much later, I realized she'd been obliquely referring to the psychic mafia, a tight-knit group of mediums who exchange inside information on their clients in order to better fleece them. There's a book: a directory of the wealthiest clients and their dark secrets, the triggers to pull. As people hop around from
psychic to psychic, they are consistently astonished at how much each one already knew about them.

The truth of the matter is that the moment the appointment is booked, the psychic will be on the phone with a colleague gleaning as much information as they can. This isn't something they do for garden-variety readings with bored housewives. This is what they do when they had real whales, clients who had too much money and spare time.

“I
might
be able to help you,” Julia continued, after thinking it over for a moment. “But I'll want a favor.”

“What?”

“An endorsement.”

“Out of the question.” Grandfather stood up and motioned to me and Dad. “Time to go.”

She tried to reason with him. “Just words, Peter.”

He shook his head. “Words are everything. Can't you understand that? If you don't speak truthfully, where is your integrity?”

“Integrity? I'm not the one in deep shit with the mob.”

Grandfather made a show of taking my hand as we headed toward the door with Dad in tow. I looked back at her and waved, then followed him out the door.

“Dad,” my father said as we walked to the car.

“Not now,” Grandfather growled.

“Dad!” he insisted.

“Get in the car!”

I buckled myself into the backseat as we headed down the long driveway. When we reached the gate, it refused to open.

“For Christ's sake!” Grandfather got out of the car to try to pull it.

In the headlights I saw a flash of gleaming diamonds as Julia ran up to him. They quickly exchanged words, then she pushed something into his hand before retreating back into her house. The gate opened and Grandfather climbed back into the car.

“What was that about?” asked Dad.

“The old broad took pity on us. She said to talk to Father Devalo. She gave me his number. He's a former priest and a spiritualist. Brutani's uncle goes to him. The uncle is the real weight in the family. Julia said that if we can get Devalo on our side, then maybe we can get Basso, the uncle, to leave be.”

“A spiritualist?” Dad asked.

“Basso goes to him to hear from his dead mother. If we can get Devalo to invite me to the séance, maybe we can ask Basso's mother to forgive the debt.”

“Are you goddamn kidding me?” snapped Dad. “This is the plan? More mobsters?”

Grandfather shot him a deathly stare. “This is the mess we made.”

“What if she says ‘no'? Christ, what am I saying, she's dead.” He turned back to me. “I'm sorry, kiddo. I'm sorry your pop is such a screwup.”