Feast Day of Fools - James Lee Burke [123]
But when Hackberry grabbed the shaft of the cross, he recoiled from the heat in the wood.
“Sheriff?” R.C. said.
“What?”
“He’s gone.”
“No, the wounds aren’t mortal.”
“Look above his rib cage. Somebody wanted to make sure he was dead. Somebody shot nails into his heart,” R.C. said.
The flashlights of the firemen jittered and cut angles through the darkness and smoke, the rain spinning down through the hole in the ceiling. “Nobody from around here could do something like this,” one of the firemen said.
“Not a chance, huh?” Hackberry said.
“No, this kind of thing don’t happen here,” the fireman said. “It took somebody doped out of his mind to do this. Like some of those smugglers coming through Miss Ling’s place every night.”
“Shut up,” Anton Ling said.
“If they didn’t do it, who did? ’Cause it wasn’t nobody from around here,” the fireman said.
“Give us a hand on this, bud. We need to get Reverend Daniels off these nails and onto a gurney. You with me on that?” Hackberry said to the fireman.
Outside, fifteen minutes later, Hackberry watched two paramedics zip a black body bag over Cody Daniels’s face. The coroner, Darl Wingate, was standing two feet away. The rain had almost quit, and Darl was smoking a cigarette in a holder, his face thoughtful, his smoke mixing in the mist blowing up from the valley.
“How do you read it?” Hackberry said.
“If it’s any consolation, the victim was probably dead when the nails were fired into his rib cage. Death probably occurred from cardiac arrest. The main reason crucifixion was practiced throughout the ancient world was that it was not only painful and humiliating but the tendons would tighten across the lungs and slowly asphyxiate the victim. The only way he could prolong his life was to lift himself on the nails that had been driven through his feet or ankles. Of course, this caused him to increase his own torment a hundredfold. It would be hard to invent a more agonizing death.”
“I’d like to believe this poor devil didn’t go through all that, that he died early,” Hackberry said.
“Maybe that’s the way it went down, Hack,” Darl said, his eyes averted. “Did you know I got a degree in psychology before I went to med school?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“I wanted to be a forensic psychologist. Know why I went into medicine instead?”
“No, I don’t,” Hackberry said, his attention starting to wander.
“Because I don’t like to put myself into the minds of people who do things like this. I don’t believe this was done by a group. I think it was ordered by one guy and a bunch of other guys did what they were told,” Darl said.
“Go on.”
“The guy behind this feels compelled to smear his shit on a wall.”
“Are you thinking about Krill?”
“No. The perp on this one has a hard-on about religion.”
“How about Temple Dowling?”
“Stop it. You don’t believe that yourself.”
“Why not?”
“Dowling is inside the system. He’s not a criminal.”
“That’s what you think.”
“No, the problem is the way you think, Hack. You’d rather turn the key on a slumlord than a guy who boosts banks. You’ve also got a grudge against Dowling’s father.”
“Say that again about religion.”
“I have to give you an audiovisual presentation? We’re talking about a murder inside a church, on a cross. It was done by a believer.”
“A believer?”
“Yeah, and he’s really pissed.”
“How about Jack Collins?”
“Collins is a messianic killer, not a sadist.”
“You should have been a cop, Darl.”
“That’s what I did in the army. It sucked then and sucks now.”
“Why?”
“Because arresting these bastards is a waste of time,” Darl said.
Hackberry walked toward his cruiser, where Pam and R.C. were waiting. The hair was singed on the backs of his arms, and the side of his face was streaked with soot. The churchyard was filled with emergency vehicles, the red and blue and white flashers pulsing in the mist.
“Wrap it up here,” he said to Pam.
“You tried to save him, Hack. When you went inside, you didn’t know if the roof was coming down or not,” she said.
“Call Ethan Riser.”
“Riser is no help,” she said.
“She’s right,