“A little,” Quinn repeated. He reached out, as if to touch the lid, hesitated, then waved his arm instead toward the altar and the Molech icon. “Please place it on the floor, there, just before the altar. Do not try anything stupid or one of your friends will die. I haven’t decided which yet. Just know that I am very serious.”
Nathan put the Ark down, deciding to curb the pretension of it being a struggle. He assumed the charade was about to end. Had Vincent Tarretti known the Ark was not real? Maybe. The man had sounded so convinced, beyond any doubt. A sudden thought, a realization that... he quickly put it out of his mind. Deal with the present. On the altar the statue’s eyes stared up, its bull-head drifting in and out of clarity with the thickening smoke from the incense stick.
Nathan felt renewing tugs of irrational terror return, as if seeping from this idol. Drifting like mist along the floor to his knees. He found he couldn’t pull his face away from the dark animal-face with its wide, open mouth. His fear grew.
God help me, he began to think, before his thoughts became muddy. It was hard to focus. He was aided unwittingly by Quinn, who grabbed the back of his jacket and pulled him away.
“Please step back, Dinneck.”
Nathan stumbled, wanting to swing out, to keep the man from touching him. He was pulled back ten steps. Quinn’s white hair and moustache, when he moved to stand beside him again, were red in the candle light, flickering in shadows.
“It’s show time,” he whispered. “Need I remind you not to move from this spot?”
Nathan didn’t reply. His captor slowly approached the Ark and knelt before it. He began to chant, the words nonsensical. Nathan wondered if this was an actual language, or sounds to help him concentrate. He’d heard of such things, even in the Christian community, with people speaking “in tongues”, people so lost in the rapture of prayer they involuntarily uttered sounds with meaning only to them.
Only this man was not praying to God, but to a demon from the Old Testament that most assumed had long ago faded into historical obscurity.
The dark stench of the terror in the room built to a physical level. Elizabeth tried moving beside him, but Paulson raised his hand, shook his head. A small fact occurred to Nathan, but one which he thought might be important, perhaps for later use. Neither of these men carried guns. At least, none that he could see. Quinn’s voice had been weapon enough so far, controlling the only person who was armed: Josh.
If the police ever became involved in the murder investigation, all evidence would point to his friend.
After a few minutes, Quinn stopped his chanting and rose, slowly, to stand over his prize. He stared at it for a long time, long enough that Nathan was starting to get worried. Nathan looked at his watch. Only eleven-thirty. It seemed they’d been captives for hours. He looked around the room. The mini-mart at the end of the strip mall closed at ten. Wasn’t Josh supposed to be the closer? Either way, anyone working there had already left. Maybe there was an alarm. He needed to get outside, break the window, do something to get the police here.
With Quinn occupied, Nathan could grab Josh’s gun before Paulson had a chance to stop him.
He tensed, preparing to lunge at his friend before Quinn could realize what he was doing. From the way the man was scowling at the box, that would happen any time now.
“Mister Everson, shoot anyone who makes a move toward you. Be sure the bullet goes into their head. More efficient that way.”
The internal momentum Nathan had been building almost pushed him toward Josh anyway. His friend had the gun raised and pointing directly at Nathan’s face. Still, if he could cut to the side....
“Actually, Mister Everson,” Quinn continued, still with his back to everyone else in the room, “shoot the woman if anyone makes a move toward you.” Josh quickly moved the gun away from Nathan and toward Elizabeth’s head.
Damn you, Nathan thought furiously. How did you know? How could you know?
Quinn turned around to face his small congregation. His smile was slight and mocking.
“Manny, if you would be so kind as to tie up Mister Dinneck, we have much to do, still.” He looked at Nathan. “One doesn’t need to be a psychic, Reverend, to sense when someone is planning a move against you. You wouldn’t be a very good poker player.” He glanced back at the Ark, the semblance of a smile dropping again. Paulson roughly tied Nathan’s wrists behind his back with what looked like a blue paisley necktie. His shoulders stretched painfully in their sockets. Quinn looked from the Ark back toward him, and his smile did not return. In fact, his mouth continued down, past what could simply be called a frown or a grimace. With a hiss, he added, “Still, everyone has one good bluff in them sometimes, don’t they?”
Nathan actually gasped when Quinn quickly reached out and grabbed the edge of the Ark’s lid.
And nothing happened.
Chapter Sixty-One
“Come over here, Paulson, and help me lift this cover.”
Manny moved slowly across the room. “But I thought, I mean, shouldn’t we wait for that guy from Maine to get here?” He looked at his watch. “He’s due any—hey, wait a second, that’s not—”
The air was changing in the room. As Paulson pointed at the plain wooden box, Quinn’s expression alternated between contempt, fear, and anger.
“Then stay where you are and learn something, you idiot!” He grabbed the cover with both hands and pulled. The box, in its entirety, raised up from the ground. Quinn glared over at Nathan, then slammed the Ark down onto the concrete floor.
It cracked; a wide crevice running down the middle of its face. Small splinters of wood and flecks of gold paint fluttered to the floor. He picked it back up, higher this time, and screamed like a mad man. Down came the box again. This time it shattered. Most of the pieces were large, oddly contorted. Other smaller splinters sailed back into the air to land on the altar or behind the macabre demon’s statue.
Quinn roared with rage again, kicked at the remnants. Elizabeth backed against the wall. Nathan was glad to see her mouth pressed closed, not daring to call attention to herself while the man’s rage exploded throughout the room.
Not knowing what else to say, Paulson muttered, “It’s empty, and... it looks different.”
Quinn screamed, “It’s not REAL, you idiot!”
Nathan tried, with everything he had, to contain the hysteria suddenly filling him. Everything since coming to town was too far removed from normal. The nightmares, Hayden’s disappearance and murder, a crypt with the Ark of the Covenant that was nothing but wood and paint, his father. All of it, insane. Nonsense.
Too much. It was all too much to expect one man to contain.
Nathan began to laugh.
A giggle at first, which he was able to stifle, but another came roaring out of him. He felt himself sliding into some uncontrolled idiocy, but he couldn’t curb it. Elizabeth had done the right thing, shrinking into the background while Quinn expended his anger on the wooden chest, but he could not stop himself. With one final guffaw and eyes tearing, Nathan knew it was useless to fight this sudden burst of emotion. He simply didn’t care any more.
“Nathan,” Elizabeth whispered, breaking her imposed silence, “be quiet.”
Peter Quinn straightened and turned. He moved slowly but consistently to close the gap between Nathan and himself. His movements were those of a jungle animal toward its prey. Nathan knew he was about to die, but he was exhausted, pushed beyond his limits. He didn’t care any more. He was tired of letting this lost, insane man terrorize him. He stopped laughing and straightened.
What would come, would come, whether he laughed at this man or did nothing at all.