“Go on,” Marge said.
Rina said, “Luke told you that in the back of his mind, he thought Bram was gay, right?”
Decker nodded.
“So what if the magazine labels just had SPARKS on them. Luke assumed they belonged to Bram. But maybe they belonged to another brother.”
Decker said, “Rina, you’re stretching-”
“Bram would protect his brothers.”
“Rina-”
Rina’s eyes got big. “Maybe, Peter, the labels said ‘A. M. Sparks.’ Or even ‘A. M. Sparks.’ You know there are more than one A. M. Sparks in Bram’s family.”
As soon as she said it, Decker knew she had hit pay dirt. “What’s Bram’s middle name?”
“Matthew.”
“Oh my God!” Marge slapped her forehead. “The father!”
“Azor Moses!” Oliver said. “They’re his magazines?”
Decker buried his head in his hands.
The father’s magazines.
And that was why a Fundamentalist like Azor Sparks hadn’t fired Decameron even after he had been convicted of picking up male hookers. Excusing Decameron because the old man had been wrestling with his own similar demons. Azor Sparks had either been latent or led a very secret life.
Had Bram known? Good chance of that. Because Azor had confided things to Bram. Perhaps he’d confessed his desires to his son. Especially after that fateful Sunday night dinner when Bram refused to equate evil thoughts with evil action.
Giving Sparks a license to fantasize.
Perhaps Sparks took it one step further and began with fantasy magazines. After all, Bram had relieved him of the guilt.
At Sparks’s memorial service, Bram had spoken to Decker about his father’s distinctions between the homosexual and the homosexual act. Decker thought about that brief interchange in the Sparkses’ kitchen. His discussion about Decameron’s moral charges, about Azor’s loyalty to his colleague despite church rumblings. And about the religious way one copes with homosexuality.
Either celibacy or sublimation in a legitimate heterosexual union.
The fifth commandment spoke of honoring one’s father and mother. By enlarging upon the precept-what honoring one’s parents might mean to a man of the cloth-Decker began to put the pieces together. Abram Matthew Sparks, the priest who put God before American law, took the magazines as his own to protect his father’s name. Just as important, he was protecting his mother from postmortem embarrassment.
Marge said, “Luke told us that Decameron had called him up, early in the morning, wanting to talk about the family. But not over the phone. Right?”
“Right,” Decker muttered.
“Maybe that’s what he wanted to tell Luke. That it may come out that his father was gay.”
“He’d bother calling Luke up just to tell him that?” Oliver said.
Marge said, “Maybe he wanted to spare the family some embarrassment and/or ridicule.”
“Then why would he call Luke?” Oliver said. “Why not Bram?”
Rina said, “Maybe Dr. Decameron felt Luke was more worldly about human foibles…being as Luke had been a user.”
“Or the answer could have been much more pedestrian,” Decker said. “Bram had been occupied that morning. Very busy. First with Mass, then with his mother. Decameron knew Dolly Sparks hated him. He wouldn’t have called up the house.”
“Aha,” Marge said. “Maybe that’s why she hated him. She found out that her husband and Decameron were having an affair.”
“Nah, I don’t buy that,” Oliver said.
“Why not?”
Oliver said, “Margie, why would Decameron call up Luke to tell him about their affair?”
“Blackmail,” Marge suggested.
“Nah, Reggie was a good guy,” Oliver said.
“You keep saying that,” Marge answered. “That don’t make it so.”
Rina said, “So how did Dr. Decameron come to have Dr. Sparks’s magazines?”
“Could be that after Azor died, Decameron went through Sparks’s office…to clean things up.” Oliver shrugged. “Maybe he found the magazines.”
“Christ!” Decker was disgusted with himself. “The Fisher/Tyne data you two had requested. At Sparks’s memorial service, Decameron told me he was going to look through Azor’s files to find the most updated numbers. Could be he came across the magazines by accident.”
Marge said, “Then Decameron took them home with him, intending to give them to Luke…to dispose of them as he saw fit.”
“The magazines which had A. M. Sparks on the wrappers,” Rina said pointedly. “Having found them in his boss’s file cabinets, Decameron knew that A. M. stood for Azor Moses. But Luke didn’t know. He just assumed they belonged to his unmarried priest brother Bram. So I’m not so stupid.”
“No, darling, you are not stupid.”
Rina smiled. “You’re a good sport.”
“I’m a lousy sport,” Decker said. “I’m pissed as hell. You know, Decameron may have also found Bram’s apartment key in Azor’s files. Maybe he thought his boss had a secret hideaway for his activities.”
“What would Azor be doing with Bram’s apartment key?” Marge asked.
“I’ve got a key to my daughter’s apartment in New York. In case of emergencies.”
Marge said, “I still don’t understand why Bram would have kept his dead father’s porno magazines in his safe.”
Decker frowned. “Because he was on his way out to visit a sick kid and didn’t know what to do with them. Because you don’t toss magazines like that in your apartment Dumpster. You hold them until you figure out how to get rid of them.”
“You know what I don’t understand,” Oliver said. “I don’t understand why Dr. Azor Moses Sparks-Mr. Austere, By the Book, Elder, Pillar of the Christian Community-would have subscribed to those kinds of magazines using his real name.”
“Arrogance,” Decker said.
“Or he wanted to get caught,” Rina said. “Maybe he was planning to come out.”
They all looked at Rina. Oliver said. “You know, Loo, she’s real bright-”
“Yes, I know that, Scott.” Decker sat up. “So…if Azor Sparks were suddenly to come out of the closet…who would that impact on the most?”
“His wife, of course,” Rina answered.
“His wife,” Decker echoed. “Say she found out about her husband’s preferences. Say she confronted him. Maybe he denied it. But maybe he admitted it, even told her he was going to leave her. Think about it, guys.”
“Here’s a woman who put in forty years with a man. Bore him six children, lived her life around him, developed her identity on the basis of being his wife. His parties were her parties. His dinners were her dinners. Through him, she had a role-as a wife, as a mother, as a leader in the church, as hostess of dinners and parties. She thought he was her soulmate, her heavenly match from God.”
“Hell hath no fury,” Oliver said.
“You’d better believe it,” Decker said. “What if he decided to leave her-sort out his feelings, wrestle with his inclinations, make his own peace with God. Maybe he took it one step further. Maybe he had someone waiting in the wings-”
“Decameron,” Marge said.
Oliver said, “No way.”
“What difference does it make?” Rina asked. “We’ll never know so let’s move on.”
Oliver was taken aback. “She’s tough.”
“Tell me about it,” Decker said. “The point is that we’re assuming Sparks was going to leave his wife for a lifestyle she considered odious and sinful. He was making a fool out of her, making a mockery out of her Fundamentalist religion, out of God. Most important, without Azor, Dolores had no role in life. If that was the case, if she had lived her life around this sinner of a man, what do you think she might have done?”
The room fell quiet.
Marge broke the silence. “It’s a big leap, Pete.”
“It’s logical,” Oliver said. “She ices the old man, then maybe ices Decameron because she thinks he’s having an affair with her husband.”
“Throwing the magazines around the bodies,” Rina said. “Like you always said, Peter. It looked like a calling card.”