Until Proven Guilty - J. A. Jance [31]
Peters and I fell into step on either side of Carstogi. Peters flashed his badge. I thought Carstogi was going to coldcock Peters on the spot.
“What’re you guys after me for?” he demanded sluggishly. “My kid is dead. I just got to town.”
I thought I’d deflect a little of the anger, calm the troubled waters. “Take it easy. We’re here to help.”
“You can help me, all right. Just tell me where that asshole Brodie is, that’s what you can do.” He turned to me with a swaying leer and shook a clenched fist under my nose. “You know where he is? I’ll take care of that son-of-a-bitch myself.”
Carstogi allowed himself to be guided onto the subway. The security guard eyed us suspiciously as we led him, ranting and raving, through the gate. He hadn’t brought any luggage. “Don‘ need any luggage,” he mumbled. “Only came to town to smash his fucking face.”
Carstogi balked at the car. “Hey, where’re you takin‘ me? I got my rights. I wanna lawyer.”
Peters was losing patience. “Shut up,” he said. “You’re not under arrest. We’re going to try to sober you up.”
“Oh,” Carstogi replied.
We went to the Doghouse. They have a sign in there that shows all roads leading to the Doghouse the same as signs all over the world tell the distance to that godforsaken end of nowhere called Wall Drug in South Dakota. Connie put us in a corner of the back dining room even though it was closed. She brought me coffee and Peters tea, then asked what Carstogi wanted. He wanted beer. He didn’t get it. Peters ordered him bacon and eggs and whole wheat toast served up with a full complement of questions. I thought it commendable that Peters put aside his own personal prejudices and ordered some decent food for Carstogi.
It took a while for food and exhaustion to do their work. When we finally dug under the bluster and bullshit, what we found was a twenty-eight-year-old guy in a world of hurt, a man who lost his wife once and his child twice, all to the same man, he figured, Pastor Michael Brodie.
The story came out slowly. First there had been a series of tent meetings to save souls, of miracles performed before wondering sinners who were prepared to follow the miracle worker to the ends of the earth. Except the miracle worker turned out to have feet of clay. He was into weird stuff like multiple wives and physical punishment for redemption of sins. Anyone who tried to stop him was liable to find himself smitten by the right hand of God. God’s right hand turned out to have a mean right hook.
Andrew Carstogi had come to his senses one morning with the crap beaten out of him. It had made a big impression. He had crossed Brodie on the righteousness of physical punishment, on Brodie’s requirement that all wives belonged to God’s Chosen Prophet first and their husbands second. Brodie hadn’t quit until Carstogi was unconscious. If Carstogi had left it at that, it wouldn’t have been so bad, but Andrew Carstogi didn’t take kindly to being beaten up or losing his wife. He called in the cops and the press.
Chicago is a pretty tolerant place, but once the charges had been made, even though Carstogi had been unable to substantiate them, Faith Tabernacle was held up to ridicule. Experience tells me that the Pastor Michael Brodies of the world can handle almost anything but ridicule.
Carstogi was Disavowed. It’s worse than it sounds. In the world of Faith Tabernacle, he ceased to exist. Not only was he no longer a member, he was no longer a husband or father either. He tried to get a court order for custody of Angela. Unfortunately, Suzanne was neither a prostitute nor a drug addict. Later, when Brodie made a killing in a real estate deal on some property the church owned, the whole congregation folded their tents and stole away in the middle of the night. Once they left Chicago