“Just what is it you’re hiding behind all of this austerity, Faith Wright?” Kane asked the empty room.
Whatever it was, he didn’t find it in the bathroom, either. It yielded shampoo, soap, and tampons. In frustration, he decided to toss Tom Wright’s room, too. It was as bad as his daughter’s. The only personal items were a pair of photographs in a plain wooden frame on his nightstand. One showed a young, pretty, blond woman holding a baby. Next to her stood a younger Thomas Wright. The other showed a different family in an almost identical pose: a very young, very pretty blond, a baby, and a dark-haired version of Moses Wright.
Moses is definitely next on my list, Kane thought.
He walked back into the living room and stood there, trying to imagine where a teenage girl would hide things she didn’t want found. He looked into the stove, which was full of cold ashes, and into a medium-size wooden trunk, which held a collection of women’s clothes that Kane figured had belonged to Wright’s wife.
I don’t suppose you can afford to throw anything away out here, he thought. Even difficult memories.
He was halfway out the door when he realized there was something else he hadn’t found in Faith’s room. A Bible. There was no copy of the Good Book in her father’s room, either. Or anywhere else in the house.
“That’s strange,” he said aloud.
In fact, the whole situation was strange. And the more he looked, the stranger it got.
I hope this isn’t one of those investigations where I end up more confused than when I started, he thought, and looking like a dope in the bargain.
On his walk back to the main building, he thought about the tidy, empty cabin and how little it had told him. Or how much. It reminded him of his apartment, and his prison cell. None was a home, just a place where people slept and marked time. Maybe Faith got tired of marking time, he thought. Maybe I will, too.
8
Only by pride cometh contention.
PROVERBS 13:10
MOSES WRIGHT SAT IN AN OFFICE OFF THE BIG ROOM where the community gatherings were held. The door was open. He was seated at a desk, a large volume bound in red leather open in front of him. His lips moved as he read. Kane sat across the desk from him. The old man ignored him.
Kane used the time to examine Moses Wright more carefully. The old man was short but, even well past his prime, had powerful shoulders and arms. His head, with its eruption of shaggy white hair and thick white beard, seemed too big for his body. Only the big shoulders kept it from looking freakish.
With his Old Testament appearance he would have been a good televangelist, Kane thought. People with big heads do well on television.
Something about him rubs me the wrong way, Kane thought. I’d better watch that. You can’t let your personal prejudices warp the investigation.
The old man was, like all of the residents of Rejoice, dressed simply. He wore no jewelry, not even a watch. Just like the cons, Kane thought. Is Rejoice just another sort of prison? Did Faith break out?
Minutes passed. Wright’s breathing was loud and steady as he read, pausing every now and then to make a note on a pad that lay next to the book.
Enough’s enough, Kane thought, and dropped his hand on the desktop with a noise like a firecracker going off. The old man’s head snapped up.
“Good morning, Elder Moses Wright,” Kane said sweetly. “I have a few questions to ask you.”
The old man glared at him.
“This book contains all the answers any man needs,” he growled, holding the big volume up so Kane could see the words “Holy Bible” stamped on the front.
“Fine,” Kane said with a smile, “just point me to the passage that tells me where your granddaughter is.”
“Does blasphemy amuse you, Mr. Kane?” Wright asked.
The old man’s hostility scratched against Kane’s nerves like fingernails dragged across a blackboard, but he kept his temper in check.
“No,” Kane said, “but I’m not here to inquire into religious matters. I’m here to find a young woman. What can you tell me that might help?”
The old man showed big, yellow teeth in a smile so unctuous that he must have wanted Kane to know it was phony.
“What makes you think I want to help you?” he asked. “I was against hiring you, but the other elders ignored me.”
“Why wouldn’t you want to help?” Kane asked. “Is your ego so much more important than the fate of your own flesh and blood?”
Wright’s mouth twisted into a bitter grin.
“You really shouldn’t talk about things you don’t understand,” he said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Kane asked.
The old man was silent for a moment.
“One of the things it means is that I must weigh the souls of Rejoice in every decision,” he said. “In your case, the question was whether it was better to have an outsider poking around here, particularly a murderer and convict, upsetting the residents, setting tongues to wagging, and exposing us all to the secular philosophy of the world, in the hope of finding one lost or more likely runaway girl, or to make our own quiet inquiries that would, no doubt, have discovered her whereabouts and left the community untroubled.”
“You are confident that you would have solved the mystery?” Kane said. “How?”
“We have many friends outside Rejoice, and many more contacts. We have many competent men and women here. How hard could it be to find one girl?”
“Presumably you tried all that before calling me in and didn’t learn anything.”
“We didn’t give it long enough. Besides, what is the fate of one body when compared to the danger to hundreds of souls?”
“So it doesn’t matter that she’s your granddaughter?”
The old man gave him another bitter grin.
“Faith is very important to me,” he said. “You’ll never know how important. But if the girl wants to live in the world, then it is better that she does. Better for her and better for Rejoice.”
Kane sat trying to make sense of what the old man was telling him. Better to let a girl disappear than let one outsider spend time in Rejoice? Better for whom? How?
“Surely you don’t think I can destroy the faith of those in Rejoice?” Kane said. “Doesn’t the Bible say, ‘For what if some did not believe? Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?’ ”
“You are a most peculiar unbeliever, Mr. Kane,” Wright said, “to quote the Bible so glibly. But we must be wary of unbelievers amongst us. For the Bible also says, ‘Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief.’ We should have much less to do with the outside world, in my view. And we certainly shouldn’t be inviting outsiders to paw through our affairs.”
Well, there was no doubting that the old man read his Bible, Kane thought. Or that he was being stubborn to the point of obstructionism.
“Bible or no Bible,” Kane said, “if you withhold information that’s germane, that’s going to make people suspicious, isn’t it? It might make them wonder if you have something to hide.”
Wright laughed.
“Do you really think you’re going to get along in this community by threatening its leader your first day here?” he asked. “And with the wagging tongues of idle speculation?”
“I’m under the impression you’re not the leader of this community anymore,” Kane said mildly. “Your son is.”
The old man stood up. He wasn’t much taller standing than sitting, Kane noticed. He leaned toward Kane. Anger snapped in his eyes.
“My son couldn’t lead a children’s parade,” he said. “I am the ultimate authority here. You’ll do well to remember that.”
Kane stood.
“What I’ll remember is that you refused to assist in the investigation of your granddaughter’s disappearance,” he said quietly.
Wright’s shoulders sagged and he settled back in his chair.
“You’re right, Mr. Kane,” he said wearily. “Pride has always been my weakness. Come, sit down again, and I’ll do my best to help you. I may disagree with the decision to hire you, but I won’t obstruct your investigation. Besides, the sooner you finish, the sooner Rejoice can get back to doing God’s work.”
Kane sat, but the conversation that ensued wasn’t much help. The old man said he didn’t know his granddaughter all that well—“the generation gap, you know,” he said—and didn’t have any idea where she might be.
“She doesn’t come to you for spiritual counseling?” Kane asked. “I thought you were the leader of this community.”
The old man didn’t like the gibe, but he kept his temper in check.
“No,” he said, “not everyone is required to confide in me. Or even, as your presence here proves, to heed my counsel.”
“So who does she confide in?” Kane asked.
The old man seemed to think about that.
“I have no idea,” he said. “I’m under the impression that Faith keeps to herself for the most part.”
“Did that bother you? Not being close to your granddaughter?”
“Are we here to inquire into my emotional state?” the old man snapped.
Kane didn’t say anything.
“I can’t see how my preferences about the girl have any bearing,” Wright said in a milder tone. “Raising her was her parents’ responsibility. Of course, after his wife died my son made a mess of that, too.”
“
Was
her parents’ responsibility? Do you think Faith is dead?”
“No, no,” Wright said. “I have no reason to think that. I just meant that Faith is old enough to know her own mind. Besides, apparently teenagers no longer require instruction, even here in Rejoice.”
“That bother you?”
“Many things bother me, Mr. Kane. Rejoice is not what it was, and has yet to become what I hope it will be. The world is too much with us, and the other elders don’t seem to be bothered by that. We are in danger of becoming a strictly secular community.”
“Would that be so bad? Is religion so important to Rejoice?”
“Mr. Kane, please. Religion—faith, anyway—is the sole reason Rejoice continues to exist. Without it, we would just be another hardscrabble town, and why would anyone stay?”
“And the religion that is required here is the one you preach?” Kane asked.
The old man laughed.
“There is only one true religion,” he said, patting his Bible, “and that is the one found in this book. Every word in it is God’s word, and they are all literally true. I study it and try to interpret it, but more than that I try to be sure that Rejoice operates according to its precepts.”
Doors were opening and closing in the building. People were tramping out of the cafeteria and down the hall from lunch.
“What did you think of the decision to let your granddaughter attend the regional high school?” Kane asked.
“I opposed it, of course,” Wright said. “Our children receive a fine education here. Many of our graduates go on to the best Christian universities. There was no academic reason for her to change, no matter what she said.”
“So why do you think she changed schools?”
The old man sat for a moment, looking down at his Bible, as if he expected to find the answer to Kane’s question on one of its pages.
“I think she was curious about the secular world,” the old man said.
“So she was going to something, rather than away from something?”
Wright’s eyes came up from the page and locked with the detective’s.
“I’m not sure I understand your question,” he said.
Kane paused to marshal his thoughts. He’d been thinking about this a lot since Laurie had told him she wanted a divorce, but he’d never said anything out loud.
“When someone leaves,” he said, “there can be one of two reasons. First, they can be going to something: a better job, a better relationship. Second, they can be going away from something: a lousy job, a bad marriage, a problem, a threat. Which do you think Faith was doing?”
The old man picked up his pen and made some notes on his pad.
“I’ll have to see what the Bible says about that theory. It’s an interesting exercise in logic,” he said, “but couldn’t a person have both kinds of reasons? Or different reasons entirely. Like enticement by Satan?”
Kane looked at the old man again, seeing something more than he’d seen before. Be careful not to think of Moses Wright as just a Bible-thumping cartoon character, he thought.
“I suppose they can,” he said. “And there’s always the possibility that they don’t leave of their own free will.”
“Does anyone do anything of their own free will, Mr. Kane?” Wright said. “Aren’t we are all just tools of the Lord’s will?”
“If I’m a tool of the Lord, he’s got to be scraping the bottom of his toolbox,” Kane said. He raised a hand to forestall the old man. “Yes, I know. Blasphemy. But back to my question. Why do you think Faith changed schools?”
The old man shrugged.
“I’m afraid I have no idea,” he said. “I always supposed it was because she was drawn to the world in some way. I know of nothing in Rejoice she would be fleeing.”
“Do you really think this place is that perfect?” Kane asked.
Wright laughed.
“I don’t think Rejoice is at all perfect,” he said. “I’m sure that for younger people in particular it might seem small and boring, despite our efforts to keep our children engaged and occupied. But I don’t think it is actively hostile in any way. I suppose boredom may have been a goad to Faith, as it has been on occasion to others. But I doubt that was what caused her to change schools. Or to leave, for that matter.”
“If, as I said, she left of her own free will,” Kane said. “But there’s no use guessing when the future might provide facts. Where were you the day Faith disappeared? Last Friday?”
The old man’s eyes narrowed, but he answered civilly enough.
“I really can’t say,” he said. “As I get older, the days seem to blend together. But I expect I was where I usually am, here in this office reading the word of God and offering advice when asked.”