Nick said, “This kind of brainwashing sounds like the Manchurian Candidate movie.”
Dave nodded. “It’s mind control. The CIA experimented with it for years. Began in the 1950’s as something call MK-Ultra, or code name Artichoke. Candidates, if you will, most susceptible to it, are subjects with what’s called a dissociative mental state, in other words, those who’ve been hurt or abused, even those with PTS … people who found detachment in creating more than one personality.”
Nick popped the cap off a Corona. “But for the average Joe, you can’t manipulate his personality to assassinate another human if that truly goes against the person’s conscience.”
Dave said, “We’re talking subconscious, Nick, which means a much altered state-of-mind. To engage an unconscious action that doesn’t have the rational parameters found in the conscious mind. And that, for most of us, comes with a guilty conscience if we cross the line — the scruples and morality factors found in our knowledge of right and wrong. So in mind control, to bypass that, the hypnotized person might answer his or her cell phone and hear the words yellow-dog, and then become an assassin, following a preprogramed post-hypnotic command.”
I said, “And, in theory, they have no memory of how they were hypnotized, or who did it. This creates the ultimate mole or spy because, even under torture, they can’t break since they have no source memory of the connection — the orders and who gave them.”
Dave stirred his drink. “And you think Dillon, your biological brother, might be capable of this level of hypnosis?”
“I do.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s beginning to look like that’s how he functions.”
“There’s no expiration date for a post-hypnotic suggestion, or in this case, command. If he’s that good at entering the human subconscious and essentially derailing the ethics of the conscience, then what if he has a band of followers he’s recruited. People he’s met, mesmerized, and hypnotized to do his bidding at his will? Would they be his subservient drones — each person fundamentally two people in one body?”
Nick ran his fingers through his hair, glanced out the window and said, “This is getting crazier by the hour. You have a mastermind psychotic brother, with a Cain complex, and a politician with a littler pecker personality, and both of ‘em have a hard on to screw you to the floor. More news types are shooting video of your boat, Sean. We got to get you the hell outta here. Someplace safe. Someplace where you aren’t bothered by what amounts to a bunch of paparazzi.”
Dave stood and looked out the tinted window. “Nick’s right. Looks like the paparazzi bus just hit Ponce Marina. You could always just step out there on the dock and tell the media that Courtney is your niece not the daughter of you and Andrea Logan. But with all members of your family dead, none of the Irish travelers the type to go on camera to corroborate or even say they knew or knew of Courtney in Murphy Village, you will literally have to produce Courtney in person to disprove what the news media have been hammering — this forbidden love child, serial killer scenario. The question is … how can you find Courtney Burke before they do, before Logan’s special ops guys find her … or God forbid, before your brother locates her?”
“I fly to Ireland.”
“Ireland? You think she’s there?”
“No, but the man who is my brother’s biological father is there. He stays in contact with Dillon. If I find him, I’ll find my brother. And just maybe before Courtney can get to Dillon … or before he can get to her.”
82
A half hour later, two Volusia County Sheriff’s deputies and a rent-a-cop, hired by the marina, began to escort the news media off the private dock, back toward the Tiki Bar. In the meantime, Dave was searching online, and wherever else in the digital world where he finds data, people and places. He looked at me, over his laptop, bifocals at the tip of his nose, his probing face lit by the bluish light from the screen. “It took a little digging, but I found the current whereabouts of Father Thomas Garvey.”
Nick said, “Bet the old bastard is lying six feet under in an Irish cemetery.”
“No, he’s still alive and kicking. And he’s still a priest despite the fact that the Catholic Church relocated him to four different parishes, each time because of allegations of sex abuse. The church paid out more than six million in lawsuits filed against Father Garvey and two other Irish priests. Most of the class-action litigation filed years after the abuse. And Father Thomas Garvey was right in the thick of things. The church simply moved him around, paid hefty fines, and tried to keep a low profile.”
Nick said, “Just like whack-a-mole, you whack-a-pedophile-priest and he pops up somewhere else. Hide your kids, mama. There’s a new guy at the church. They rotate their pedophiles ‘till the music stops, and that’s a sad damn song.”
I set Max down on the salon floor. “Where is he right now?”
Dave looked down, through his bifocals, his eyes searching the screen. “A church in County Cork. St. Colman’s Cathedral. It’s in Cohb … an Irish seaport. He’s semi-retired. According to this bio, Father Garvey continues to serve God and his parishioners as a teacher, healer, and a minister, following the example set by the first priest, Jesus Christ.”
I thought of my mother, thought of what she endured. Thought of what might have happened had my father lived and not been shot in the back of his head. What would that have meant for me? The two people who raised me were fine, loving parents. The year of their tragic deaths, my mother died in a car accident a few months after my father was shot to death, was a life-changing year for me. I missed them then, and I miss them today. Now, I know, the only mother I’d ever known, was my biological mother’s cousin. I was fortunate. I had a good upbringing, and at the end I had four hours with the woman who had given me birth.
Dave closed his laptop and pushed back in his chair. “Sean, maybe Ireland’s not such a good idea. Even if you do go and find this guy, he might clamp up tighter than a clam. If he knows where Dillon Flanagan is, there’s no assurance he’ll tell you. And if he did, what’s to keep him from warning your brother? Maybe you can track Courtney down from here.”
“Time isn’t on my side. If Logan’s people can throw her into the trunk of a car, we’ll never find her. And the bastard will probably win the election, too.”
Nick said, “And don’t forget about your brother.”
“I can’t forget about him, the cold warning he whispered to me on the phone won’t leave.”
Dave pushed his glasses on the top of his head, buried in his thick, white hair. He exhaled like a bear and said, “Cain killed his brother, lied to God about it, was banished and roamed the earth. We know your brother, Dillon, is migratory — working carnivals, conning the faithful in small churches. I think you’re going to Ireland for an ulterior motive, too. The old priest might squawk and tell you where Dillon’s holing up, but the priest is the guy who raped your mother, impregnated her with a bastard son … and he may be the killer who ended your father’s life with a bullet. Since we’re talking forty-something years ago, way before all the public outcry over the clergy and pedophilia, here was a heterosexual priest raping young women under the bullshit deception of a divine plan. And it’s not until years later, his victims, all grown women, are finally heard. Unfortunately, your mother wasn’t one of them.”
I stood and stepped to the starboard window in the salon. The lone security guard paced at the end of the dock, near Jupiter. All of the news media were back at the public area, the head of the dock closest to the marina office and the Tiki Bar. I said, “Nick, I don’t want to walk through the mob. Can you bring your Zodiac around to Gibraltar’s stern? Max and I will hitch a ride with you to my Jeep.”