The Center for Inner Faith consisted of a large main house and four outbuildings on sixteen acres of gently rolling farmland that sloped down to the banks of the Occoquan Creek. The land around the house was overrun with weeds and thickets. Bent, bare trees formed bizarre sculptures against a pewter sky.
A skinny yellow dog that had been asleep on the front porch raised its head and looked in the direction of Lydia’s car as it moved slowly up a dirt road toward the house. The road was pitted and scarred, and she had to be careful to avoid some of the larger holes.
A young man with a shaved head, wearing a soiled, long white tunic, had been sitting by a front window. He, too, saw her car, sat up and shifted a .22 caliber rifle from his lap to a more ready position.
Lydia stopped twenty yards from the house, turned off the ignition and took in her immediate surroundings. She was overwhelmed by the bleakness and desolation of it all. If the Center for Inner Faith were, indeed, a church, it was not exactly advertising it. There were no signs, no crosses, no nothing but an old farm, its buildings weather-beaten, its land scarred by years of exposure and neglect.
As she got out of the car Lydia noticed the young man in the window. She clutched her briefcase beneath her arm and went to the porch. The dog did not growl, nor did it get up to greet her. It stayed where it had been sleeping, its head raised. It had a sad face, or was that her imagination?
“Hello there,” Lydia said as she climbed a decaying set of wooden steps. “Good boy.” Calm down, she told herself. She needed it more than the dog… wrong, he needed it too.
A low, guttural growl made her stiffen. “Easy boy, easy… me Lydia, you friend—”
The front door suddenly opened and the young man who’d been observing her stood just inside, the rifle hanging loosely from one hand. “Miss James?” he asked in a high-pitched voice.
“Yes.”
He stepped back to allow her to pass. She cast a quick, final glance at the dog and stepped inside. Immediately to the right was a large room furnished like an office. Logs burned brightly in a fireplace. A man sat behind an elaborately carved desk. He, too, had a clean-shaven head. He was considerably older than the one who’d let her in, and smaller. The massive desk dwarfed him even when he stood. “I’m Francis Jewel, Miss James. Please come in and warm yourself by the fire.”
She entered the room. Jewel extended his hand and she took it. The touch of him was not pleasant. His hand was small and cold; it felt like wax.
“Thank you for allowing me to come.”
“There seemed little choice,” he replied, pointing to a ladder-back chair next to the desk. “Would you care for coffee or tea? I’d recommend the tea. We make it with cinnamon, herbs and honey.”
“The tea sounds fine.” Jewel motioned to the young man at the door, then resumed his seat behind the desk. He leaned back, his tiny hands crossed on his chest, a weak smile on his lips. “Well, now, I suppose you’d like to see Mark Adam.”
Lydia nodded.
“I’ll have him summoned in a moment. Before I do that, however, I must ask whether your interest in him is solely because of his father’s death or because you have a parallel interest in our church.”
Lydia wasn’t sure what he meant and told him so.
“It’s a reasonable question, Miss James. After all, when you’ve tried to serve God for years despite vicious attacks by those who do not share your faith and who feel threatened by it, you tend to become… how shall I say it, you become gun-shy.”
Lydia crossed her legs. “I’m not threatened by your beliefs, Mr. Jewel. I’m here because of my work with a Senate committee charged with the investigation of Senator Caldwell’s murder. Any personal interest in your church, if there were any, would be based on curiosity.”
“You’ve read the untrue things said about us, I presume, heard them on television.”
“Some, yes.”
“And?”
“And how have I responded? Again, like most people. I do question some of the practices I’ve heard about, the means of raising funds, the alleged control exerted over church members.” She almost said cult instead of church and was glad she hadn’t. She was also disappointed in herself that she’d so quickly been drawn into a discussion about the cult in the first place. “I really would rather not discuss your church, if it’s all right with you. That’s not my purpose here.”
“But you will take away with you certain impressions of us. I think it only fair that I have an opportunity as the executive director to present a more balanced picture… Oh, here’s our tea.” It was poured from an elegant silver teapot into antique china cups. Lydia tasted the tea, nodded her approval.
“I’m glad you like it, Miss James. That will be all, Richard.” The young man left the room, closing a set of sliding doors behind him.
“Now, Miss James, while we enjoy our tea and the fire, allow me to tell you a little about the Center for Inner Faith. I will tell you the truth. I hope you are ready to hear it.”
“I’m not sure it matters whether I am or not.”
Twenty minutes later he’d gone through what Lydia was certain was a canned speech, filled with positive images of The Center and its goals. He pointed out that cult members were in no way restricted in their movements. As long as they were faithful to the cult’s beliefs, he told Lydia, they were free, actually encouraged to mingle with the outside world and to carry their faith to others.
Lydia realized that he was at least technically correct… members of the cult were often seen in town, handing out leaflets, stopping passersby to tell their story and, of course, to solicit funds. Physically, at least some of them seemed free. The extent of mental control was another matter, which she was tempted to raise but didn’t.
Jewel also said that he was only the administrative head of the church, and that its spiritual leader, the Reverend Sylvan Quarles, was the pivot point around which everything revolved.
Lydia knew about Quarles from what she’d read in the papers. He was in his late sixties, tall and charismatic, with a stentorian voice and flowery vocabulary, an impeccable dresser whose eyes, they said, blazed when he spoke. It was also said that he could mesmerize his audiences, although a psychiatrist friend had once explained to Lydia that the real power was within the listener. This psychiatrist used hypnosis in his practice for behavior modification, for smoking and obesity, and told Lydia that each person had an inborn capacity to enter a hypnotic trance. The ones with a high capacity were most easily persuaded. They tended to suspend critical judgment, surrender it, when confronted with an authority figure.
Throughout his lecture she nodded when appropriate, asked a few questions to clarify points even though she wasn’t interested in having them clarified, and patiently waited for him to finish so that she could get to Mark Adam Caldwell.
“Any questions, Miss James?” Jewel asked as he finished his spiel.
“This administrative center is one of four sanctuaries in Virginia. We have centers in eleven other states, and have recently opened them in Germany and France.”
“That’s very impressive, and I might like to discuss it further with you at some later date, but I do have a time problem today. Could I please see Mark Adam Caldwell now?”
Jewel went to the door, said something to the young man, who’d kept a vigil in the hallway. Jewel returned to the desk and, moments later, Mark Adam entered the room. He wore the same sort of robe worn by the other young man, except that his was freshly laundered and ironed.
“Hello, Mark,” Lydia said, standing.
His face was blank as he took two steps toward her, extended his hand and gave her a single nod of his head.
“Sit down, Mark,” Jewel said. The boy took a chair on the opposite side of the desk and stared straight ahead, past Jewel and out a window.
“I told you that Miss James wanted to speak to you,” Jewel said, “and I agreed that she could. I’ll be here with you all the time.”
It appeared to Lydia that Mark Adam was either drugged or in some unexplained state of altered consciousness. She felt as though she’d entered a mental institution and was visiting a patient. “How are you?” she asked Mark.
Slowly he turned his head and looked at her, as though to get a fix on her identity, then said in a near monotone, “I’m very well, thank you. I’m very happy. How are you?”
“I’m fine, Mark. It’s good to see you again.”
He returned his attention to the window.
“Mark, are you feeling well?”
“Mark is doing wonderful work here at the center,” Jewel said. “He’s found an increasingly close relationship with God and serves him with all his spirit. Isn’t that right, Mark?”
“Yes. God gives me the day and night, and I use them for his glory.”
Lydia cleared her throat, opened her briefcase and pulled out a yellow ruled legal pad on which she’d written the questions she wanted to ask. “Mark, as you may know, I’ve been appointed special counsel to a Senate committee to investigate your father’s murder. That’s why I’m here. You’ll be called to testify before the committee sometime in the near future, but I wanted to have a chance to talk with you first. You don’t have to, you know. If you’d like, you can ask for a lawyer to be with you whenever you say anything about your father’s death.”
“I know that.” He said it with more animation than before—a sullen-voiced animation.
“I discussed it with Mark,” Jewel said, “and he realizes his rights. We have his best interests at heart here. We’re all one large and loving family.”
Lydia ignored Jewel. “Mark, do you know anyone who might have wanted to kill your father?”
He shook his head.
She hesitated, then asked matter-of-factly, “Did you want to see him dead?”
His face again took on a hint of animation. He looked directly at her. “No.”
“You said things to the police, Mark, that might be construed as being… well, as being hostile toward your father. Would you agree that you felt anger toward him?”
“Of course he did,” Jewel said. “Mark Adam’s father was hardly what you would call a decent God-fearing man.”
“Mr. Jewel, I’d appreciate it if you would allow Mark to answer the questions himself. Having you here is one thing, answering for him is another.”
Jewel pursed his lips, which drew his small nose to an even finer line. One finger stroked his cheek as he prepared to speak. Lydia didn’t wait. She went back to Mark and asked, “Do you understand why I’m asking these things, Mark? I’ve been a friend of your family for years and I want to help in any way I can. I also have a duty to attempt to get to the truth. I’d like to find that truth without hurting those people I care about, and you’re one of them.”
“No one cared about him until he came here,” Jewel said.
Again she ignored him. “Mark, some people think that Jimmye’s murder might, in some way, shed some light on your father’s death. What do you think about that?”
Jewel raised up in his chair. “Really, Miss James, is it necessary for such cruelty? The boy has lost his father as well as a sister… to bring up that unfortunate incident is, to me, unconscionable.”
“Mark, I ask you again, do you think that Jimmye’s—”
“Jimmye was a harlot, a Messalina hetaera.”
“What?”
“She sinned and was punished. It’s as it should be.”
“She was like a sister, Mark.”
“She was a sister of the Devil,” he said in his near-singsong voice. “She gave her body to the Devil.” He shifted in his seat and placed his large hands flat on the desk. The thick, muscular body beneath the robe began to tremble. “Those who sin against the Father must be punished.”
Or with the father? she couldn’t help think to herself…
“I think this has gone far enough,” Jewel said. He patted Mark’s forearm. “I don’t think Miss James has any further questions for you, my son. You can return to your duties.”
“No, I’m not finished,” Lydia said. “I’d like to know why he attended his father’s party after so many years of estrangement. I’d like to know about Jimmye and his relationship with her. I’d—”
But Mark Adam had already stood up, turned and left the room.
“I resent the way this has been handled,” Lydia told Jewel. “The boy seems in another world. What have you done to him?”
“We have given him peace and hope, something you probably wouldn’t understand, Miss James. He came from a family of sinners, rich and powerful people who abused their position here on earth, who defied their God every day of their lives. Here Mark Adam is with those who shun the secular, the materialistic, the sins of society. Here, Miss James, he can fulfill his Father’s wishes for him.”
“His father is dead. His father has been murdered.”
“Good day, Miss James.”
She placed her materials in her briefcase, zippered it shut and left the house, her every movement under the scrutiny of the armed young cult member.
She drove back to Washington as quickly as possible, stopped in at her private offices, where she was filled in on developments during her absence, dictated a sheaf of letters into a recorder while she munched halfheartedly on a chicken salad sandwich delivered from a local luncheonette, called Clarence but didn’t find him at home, then finally called her committee office in the Senate. Rick Petrone answered.
“How’s everything?” she asked, her mouth half-filled with chicken salad.
“Where have you been?”
“I’ve spent the morning with crazies, I’m sorry to say.”
“Looks like Ginger spent an evening with one.”
“What do you mean?”
“She was mugged and robbed last night—”
“What? My God… is she all right?”
“A concussion. She’s at Doctors Hospital. They say she’ll be okay. The guy hit her over the head and stole her purse. After he’d slashed both rear tires on her car.”
“Good Lord, I’ll be there in an hour. Will you be there?”
“I’ll hang around.”
“Any calls?”
“A dozen or so. Where were you this morning?”
She briefly told him of her trip to the cult headquarters.
“You ought to stay away from places like that.”
“I’m sure you’re right. See you.”
***
Twenty minutes later Senator Wilfred MacLoon walked into Veronica Caldwell’s Senate office, closed the door behind him. “This whole situation with Lydia James is getting out of hand. She thinks she’s Sam Spade and Sherlock Holmes rolled into one.”
“Why do you say that?”
MacLoon, briefed by Rick Petrone, told her about Lydia’s trip to cult headquarters and her interview with Mark Adam.
Veronica’s lips tightened. “All I can say, Will, is that if I’ve made a mistake in pushing for Lydia James to be special counsel, I meant well. I spoke with her recently and rather thought I’d gotten through to her that—”
“What did you tell her?”
“Oh… just that the committee has a limited function and that all other aspects of Cale’s death are the business of the MPD.”
“Evidently she doesn’t listen too well.”
“I’ll speak with her again.”
“Please do. I want this committee to be out of business within a month, and it never will be if I have to put up with her nonsense. By the way, did you hear about that researcher on her staff, Ginger Johnson?”
“No.”
MacLoon told her what Rick Petrone had reported.
“Well… I certainly hope she’s all right.”
“Oh, they say she will be… I haven’t had lunch yet. Today’s Oregon Day. They flew in salmon steaks. Join me?”
“I’d love to. Thank you, Will.”