The gathering, p.21
The Gathering, page 21
But the cape was the closest they came to apprehending the Gathering’s prophet that night and finding the woman with her. In the days that followed, too many reports of women who answered to part of their descriptions came in. Beloved studied hundreds of photographs and attended a few identification parades, but none brought them closer to the women they were looking for. Their get-away became an embarrassment for Agents Graves, Needham and the rest of the Bureau.
The stimulation the hunt for Jeanne Robinson had brought into her life was over. It left Beloved feeling empty, but a lull in her schedule gave her the time to complete her report on the prison riot and to attend Jordan Carey’s parole hearing.
At the hearing she told the board that Carey had been very helpful in the Jeanne Robinson cult matter and recommended that his help be taken into consideration. She also told the hearing that he and his victim in the road rage incident had been members of the same cult and that this connection had not been investigated either by the officers involved or by his attorney. The prison’s head warden testified that Carey’s wild temper too had eased and he now co-operated with the guards. The board decided to release him, but with the provision that he would have to remain for a year in a halfway house under close supervision. He sent a note to Beloved, inviting her out on a date. She responded, thanking him, but declined the invitation.
Beloved was lonely. Close interaction with human beings of the masculine section of humanity did not work out well in the weeks following the destruction of the Gathering. Beloved wondered about it, but did not understand why that was the case. She considered the possibility of a pet and spent some time looking at the animals on display in pet shops. She was drawn to a litter of woolly white kittens, but decided they would probably waste more of her time in brushing and cleaning than made sense. A small Alsatian was altogether beguiling and he would grow into a fine watch dog, but the pet shop woman said placing him in a kennel every time she was out of town would cause him to slide into depression, and living with a depressed dog missed the point. She wanted an animal that would lift her spirits, not drag them down. Fish in a little aquarium were pretty, but they were hopeless companions. Talking to them was pointless and you could not even stroke one. Then, there were birds. They were also pretty and some even made a pretence of talking to you. Ultimately, whatever she chose was going to take looking after, and making special arrangements whenever she was away.
After she gave up the idea of a pet, she again considered the possibility of a full-time guy. Christ, if animals were a problem, she decided, they were nothing compared to a live-in man. Men did have a kind of advantage in that, while she was out of town, she would not have to make special arrangements for them. Most would make their own arrangements. That could, of course, result in problems of a different kind.
Not all guys had that need to the same extent though. Some would sit at home and wait patiently and celibately for her return, or so she heard from time to time. Although she had never met such a one, she was sure they were out there somewhere. But why is it, she wondered, that she was always attracted to the other kind?
Eventually she found herself resorting to her stand-by drugs. She bought twenty-five different kinds of coffee and a stock of her favourite whiskey and found the whiskey and most of the coffee brands excellent, but they provided no company, and could give and receive no caresses.
What the hell, she thought. Living alone is not so bad. Since the Gathering had been brought to a summary halt and many of its members arrested, life had been far more placid and that was all right. She was glad of the peace, but missed the excitement. She had attended some concerts and plays, been to a few movies, sometimes with friends and sometimes alone, and bought a painting at the exhibition of a talented amateur artist. Three or four unread books lay at her bedside. Perhaps a few thousand filled her book cases, of which maybe half had been read. And then there were far more television channels than any sane person would want to explore. You could survive alone.
As for Martha, she refused protection. Beloved visited her a few times and, as far as she could see, Martha spent her days both hoping for and dreading the return of her daughter.
Her thoughts found a new focus one lovely spring afternoon. Walking home from the mall where the unsuccessful hunt for a pet had been conducted, she was enjoying the sunshine. From a block away she saw a man outside the building where she lived. He was leaning against the outside wall and she knew, without any conscious reason for it, that he was waiting for her. “Good afternoon, Ma’am,” he said when she drew close. “I think you’re Ms Childe. My boss would like to see you, if you have half an hour.” When she looked enquiringly at him, he showed her his identification card and continued, “Agent Needham. He says it’s not a pleasant matter.”
“I see. Do you know what it is?”
“I’m just the messenger, Ma’am. I have a car here, if you’ll come. And I’ll bring you back afterwards.”
The messenger was of the same expressionless type as Agent Graves and Technician Philip. Beloved wondered if they might receive training as poker players. He drove to a part of the city in which office buildings had fallen into disrepair and had been taken over by light industry, the sort in which heavy loads had caused elevators to break down, and where repairs were a luxury.
He stopped at a once palatial structure, only four stories high, but filling an entire city block. It carried a sign that held a warning that the property was condemned. Needham’s messenger parked in front and led the way through a marble entrance into a courtyard that had once contained a garden. On the way they passed a group of three uniformed officers leaving. At the far end of the courtyard she saw the kind of group she had seen around the body of Jennifer Seddon at the suburban stream.
At the centre of the group a fountain was still bubbling weakly into a pond that had not been cleaned in a long time. The remains of a few dead waterlilies clung to its sides. Some of the men at the pond turned to watch her approach. Needham detached himself from the others and came towards her.
“What is it this time?” Beloved asked.
“I thought you should see for yourself,” he said. He led the way to the spot where the group of officers was most dense. The body was on its back in shallow water, only the head and shoulders protruding. It must have been left there naked, but one of the officers had covered it with a sheet from the neck down. The face was unnaturally pale.
“Is it the same?” Beloved heard herself ask.
“Precisely the same,” Needham said. “The blood has been drained and she is tattooed. I’ll bet the blood that remains is full of theopental. We’ll know for sure later today.”
Beloved looked at the face, then looked at it more closely. She moved along the side of the pond to get within a few metres of the body. When she was sure she turned to Needham, her mouth hanging open slightly in surprise. “Brunhilde,” she said.
“I thought so. You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“So this thing is still among us. I was sure that woman would have slipped out of the city, even out of the country.”
“But we don’t know she did this,” Beloved said. In the moment that followed she could hardly believe she had said it.
“Oh?”
“In fact we sure, I suppose.”
“What we are sure about is less important. Finding her is everything.”
“Yes.”
“We will search again every corner of the city and the country. I just wanted you to be aware that this thing is still alive among us. I’m not asking for your help this time, only begging you to be careful.” He looked at her through his tinted glasses. Beloved thought he looked even more like a professor today. “Do you want to be taken home now?”
“Yes.” She turned to go, but stopped and faced him again. “One thing I never discovered. What was in those glasses, the night you raided them? It hasn’t come to court yet.”
“I think you know what was in them. Do you really want it spelled out?”
“No,” she said. She turned again and this time she started towards the car. “No, I don’t really need to know the details and, if we find her, I won’t be testifying in court. You won’t need me.”
THE PRISON DOCTOR – the second Beloved Childe Story
by Wessel Ebersohn
The story of the Prison Doctor is inspired by real crime cases in which male long-term prison inmates seek to seduce female prison personnel. In most cases the sex is the minor attraction for them. The real aim is escape. Some have been successful. A few have gotten clear away, but the usual result is a jail sentence for the prison officer.
In a widely publicised New York case two male prisoners made promises of a new life on a Mexican beach (a la Shawshank Redemption) to a guard who was unhappy in her marriage. The escape was successful, but in the manhunt that followed one prisoner was killed and the other returned to prison with an increased sentence. The guard got her first taste of life on the other side of the bars.
The Prison Doctor begins with Magnuson, a convicted killer on death row, seeing the prison’s new doctor as a weakness in the security system. Gillian, the doctor, is a timid and unhappy woman who has been through two unsuccessful marriages. Magnuson believes she is ripe for the picking. He sees her as his way off the Row and out of the prison.
At the same time prisons expert Beloved Childe is busy with a project in the prison and gets to know the doctor. She has interviewed Magnuson and understands just how manipulative he is. She sees Gillian falling under his spell and tries to warn her against him, but the doctor’s needs are too great. She believes that at last this is a man who is sensitive to her needs. When she is attacked on the street she does not realise the Magnuson is behind it and this is part of a softening up process, the aim of which is to make her dependent on him. She is convinced that he is the one person who truly cares for her.
Despite her suspicions the escape is a surprise to Beloved. She is faced with a double challenge: she wants to help find Magnuson and Gillian before any more damage is done. He may try to kill her the moment he no longer has a need for her. At the same time she believes Gillian to be an innocent victim and wants her to be seen as such. She can see no sense in the doctor, whose real crime is foolishness, spending time in jail.
Beloved’s cross country chase to intercept them is based on a single clue, something Gillian said in an unguarded moment.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Wessel Ebersohn is an internationally published author, whose works have been published and distributed in all English speaking countries on both sides of the Atlantic, and has been translated into many European languages. In the 1980s two of his books were banned by the government of the time, but released on appeal. He was also the editor of Succeed magazine and Debate Journal. In 2013 he won a Pica award as business-to-business writer of the year. He lives with his wife on the edge of the South African bushveld.
Wessel Ebersohn’s work:
Yudel Gordon stories -
Book 1 – A Lonely Place to Die, 1977
Book 2 - Divide the Night, 1981
Book 3 - Closed Circle, 1990
Book 4 - The October Killings, 2009
Book 5 - Those Who Love Night, 2010
Book 6 - The Top Prisoner of C-Max, 2012
Book 7 - Deluge, 2022
Other Books -
The Centurion, 1980
Store up the Anger, 1980
The Otter and Mr Ogilivie, 1987
Klara's Visitors, 1988
In Touching Distance, 2004
The Classifier, 2011
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Wessel Ebersohn, The Gathering
