"She's a well of information, not only about the church, but about its enemies. And so far as I know, she doesn't sell that kind of information—not to individuals. She gives it away. Although she might charge a corporation like yours."
He emptied his cup and didn't pour any more. Apparently we were about done.
"She was an early member," he continued, "one of the founding members. Before that she was a Noetie—one of Leif Haller's followers. Beginning in her teens. But she was always self-determined. She quit the Noeties when Haller began to demand conformity. Later she quit the church for the same reason.
"Since I've been out," Hamilton went on, "I've met a lot of ex-churchies, some of them oldtimers like Molly. And they tell stories. One of them is that Molly was Ray Christman's girlfriend, once upon a time. That may be why she never got expelled."
* * *
I left the restaurant knowing that Molly Cadigan was someone I wanted to talk to.
6
MOLLY CADIGAN
Reading the L.A. Times at my desk the next morning, I found an item that jarred me. "Gerald Williams, owner and operator of a firm called Gnostic Withdrawal Assistance, was arrested yesterday on a charge of possessing for sale a quantity of crack cocaine." Crack has long since been out of style, but it still has its users.
Anyway that rocked me back in my chair. Williams a pusher? I didn't believe it.
He was being held in lieu of $50,000 bail.
I got on the phone to the LAPD and identified myself, explaining that Williams was an information source for me in an investigation. I asked to speak to the officer in charge of the case. A Lieutenant Emiliano Gonzaga accepted the call. My name was familiar to him. He told me they'd gotten their tipoff from a teenaged kid named Joseph R. Minnis.
"I can't help but wonder," I said, "if Joseph R. Minnis isn't a Gnostie. Or was put up to it by the Gnosties."
"You're not the first to wonder," he told me. "We're looking into it. So far as we can determine, Minnis isn't a Gnostie, but he is a street hustler on the make.
"We found the package in Williams' restroom cabinet, with the extra soap, scouring powder, and TP. And failed to find his prints on it, or anyone else's. It could have been left there by anyone. We've also verified that he lets street people use his restroom. If we don't get firmer evidence against him today, we plan to release him late this afternoon."
Gonzaga paused and grinned. "Incidentally, my office has taken half a dozen calls like yours. Williams has lots of friends."
I hadn't foreseen that, but it didn't surprise me. "Thanks, Lieutenant," I told him, and we disconnected. I felt pretty burned. I was sure the church had set Williams up, and right then I really wanted to get something on them: hopefully Ray Christman's murder. Assuming, of course, that Christman had been murdered.
* * *
When I'd finished the paper, I called Molly Cadigan's number and caught her at home. I explained who I was, and told her I was investigating Christman's disappearance. We agreed to meet at her place at ten o'clock, which gave me plenty of time. Briarcliff Drive is in the Hollywood Hills, but it's not one of those winding little goat-trail streets that appear and disappear up there. It's easy to find and keep track of.
So on a hunch, I went out of my way to swing by the Campus, and parked in the church's lot. I stopped in at the Saints' Deli to look at the notice board. Sure as hell, there was a Times fax right in the middle, with everything else moved back a little to draw attention to it. Next I went into the Neophyte Building and found one on the notice board in their reception area, edged with red tape to make it hard to overlook. A typed note beneath it read: "This is the kind of person who attack Ray adn the Church. And this the kind of thig that happen to them." Replete with typos and poor grammar on church notepaper. I wondered how the church could favorably impress someone like Armand Butzburger. If someone typed for him like that, he'd fire their ass in a minute, I was willing to bet.
When I came out, I saw a guy across the street and down a ways, sitting on the edge of a planter lighting a cigarette. A lightish-brown black guy with a short beard. Minutes earlier he'd been going into the deli when I was just about to leave. I couldn't help wondering.
So I sat down on a bench and pretended to check through my pocket notebook, waiting to see what he'd do. After a minute he got up, crossed the street, and walked into the Neophyte Building. I put my notebook back in my pocket and went to my car, where I sat and waited. Five minutes later he came into the lot and drove away in a somewhat beat-up red Chevy. Not a sea blue Hyundai. False alarm, I decided, and left.
Next I drove past Gnostic Withdrawal Assistance, which was pretty much on my way. There was space at the curb, so I stopped by. The place was open, with a white guy at the desk now. He wasn't as big as Williams, but he made the same kind of impression: straight, competent, fearless. I introduced myself; his name was Eric Fuentes.
"Gerald may be back pretty soon," I said, and told him what Lt. Gonzaga had told me.
He laughed. "It figures. The church's been caught in enough dirty tricks that people distrust them automatically."
Then I told him about finding the Times faxes at Saints' Deli and in the Neophyte Building. He gave a wry grin. "Right," he said. "It's the Disinformation Section in the Division of Public Relations. That's the way they operate. They're in charge of dirty tricks."
He was matter-of-fact as hell about it. I was surprised he didn't look mad, and told him so. "It's a waste of energy to get mad," he answered, "and a bigger waste to stay that way." He grinned again. "I admit I was steamed when I got here this morning and found a copy taped to our front door. And to most of the front windows along the block." He gestured at his waste basket. "I ripped 'em all off." "They actually have something they call the Disinformation Section?"
"Yeah. It's not shown on the open T.O., the table of organization that the public sees, but it's there, part of the Information Department, Division of PR."
"You must be a Gnostie exile."
"You've got it. I was a case reviewer in the Technical Division. Got in a row with Evanson himself, and told him what I thought. A year earlier I'd have said 'yes sir,' and done what he ordered, regardless of my own judgement. My eyes had been opening since a friend of mine got kicked out by a kangaroo court."
And apparently all in the name of saving the human race. The more I hear about them, I thought, the less I like them. I wondered if Fuentes' friend was Fred Hamilton.
* * *
I looked at my watch then. It was 9:37, and I'd rather get somewhere early than late, so I left. I got there early enough that I sat in the car and listened to KFWB News Radio for a few minutes. At 9:58 I knocked at Molly Cadigan's door. A young woman opened it, wearing blue jeans, a red-and-white checkered blouse, and a small apron. I decided she must be family. "My name is Seppanen," I told her. "I have an appointment to see Ms. Cadigan." She took my card and peered at it, then turned.
"Molly!" she shouted, "it's Mister—" She stumbled and looked harder at the card. "Mr. Seppanen to see you." She said the syllables well enough, but put the accent on the second, even though I'd said it for her. That happens a lot. "Come right in, sor," she said and, turning, led me through a foyer and the living room, then into a hall, chattering as we went. Her speech was so Irish, I could hardly believe it. She gestured me into what had probably been a large bedroom originally. As no one else was there, she waited with me. It was an office now, with a big heavy table, desk, built-in bookshelves, and a Hewlett-Packard Executive VIII, about right for the Mount Wilson Observatory. Wide old-fashioned French doors stood open, with a balcony outside. The morning haze had burned off, and beyond the wrought-iron railing was a long view across the L.A. Basin, burnished by April sun and framed by the tops of eucalyptus trees lower on the ridge.