"I understand," I said. "This morning Mr. Keneely told me to report to you today on a major—call it 'a happening'—last week. Beyond that, a new possibility occurred to me, and I spent the weekend in Oregon, checking its feasibility.
"But let's talk about the psychics first, because frankly I'm surprised it bothers you. I thought the church considers psychic powers real, and teaches that a person can learn to use them."
He nodded, looking slightly troubled. "But what it takes to become psychic," he said, "these gentlemen very likely have never experienced. I'm assuming that neither of them is a member of the church."
"The church says that the only way to psychic power is through its training?"
"To reliable psychic power, yes. First through its counseling services, which remove the deep spiritual traumas that foul the channels, so to speak. The individual parishioner may have sporadic psychic experiences even during early counseling, but only sporadic. The channels are opened further by advanced counseling, which prepares the parishioner for the training that programs and exercises those channels."
Then he added, almost apologetically, "The procedures are still incomplete. As of now, the ability varies considerably between individuals."
I was tempted—well, not tempted, but it crossed my mind—to ask him how advanced Lon Thomas was. Thomas showed all the perceptual sensitivity of a stone. Instead I said, "I have something here that may interest you." Then I rolled my chair to one side so he could move in beside me, and called up the WSU catalog of psychics. "When you've read the introduction," I said, "I'll show you what I have in mind."
When he was done, I called up the material on Charles Tomasic, the psychic photographer. As he read, Butzburger commented that he'd read about a much earlier case, Ted Polemes, who'd been studied at the University of Nebraska. Polemes had produced remarkable pictures, but was very inconsistent, and showed little control of his talent. When Butzburger had finished, he looked at me. "And your plan is to . . . ?"
"Information I've obtained indicates that Mr. Christman's greatest susceptibility to abduction was at his mountain hideaway in Oregon, and that he was usually there when solar storms promised to provide an auroral display. He loved the aurora.
"This weekend I scouted the Hideaway from the air, visually and with infrared and electronic surveillance. It seems entirely practical to land on the ridge where he has a small observatory . . ."
Butzburger interrupted. "I've been to his lodge. There are radar installations on the ridge, and some kind of defensive installation to repel possible aerial attacks."
I remembered Hamilton saying that Christman hosted rich Gnosties at the Ranch when he wanted to pitch something to them. Apparently he'd used the Hideaway for the same purpose. "We looked into that," I said. "To date, the only response the church has made to overflights has been in the federal court at Salem, and our instruments showed no indication of even radar monitoring. As a matter of fact, the place seems nearly deserted. Inserting a rumor of radar and surface-to-air missiles could have been a useful fiction to discourage aerial snooping."
I'd expected at least some sign of annoyance from Butzburger at that, but he simply looked thoughtful. I continued. "The fence that runs past the observatory is a boundary fence. The land on the other side belongs to the Forest Service. Because landing there looks feasible, I plan to call Dr. Hjelmgaard today and examine the possibility that we can fly Charles Tomasic in there with us. And maybe get a photograph of an abduction in progress."
He shook his head, but before he said anything, I went on. "There is another aspect of the case that came to a head last week. An attempt was made to kill me. And there'd been an earlier occurrence, a bombing, that seemed to be aimed at me."
If he'd intended to say anything, that stopped him. Then I told him of my interview with Thomas, when I'd posed as a freelance writer, and the events that led to the bombing that killed five people. That was enough to tighten his lips; he was waiting for me to accuse the church, something he wasn't about to accept.
I forestalled that, too. As I'd finished describing the bombing, I'd called up the statements recorded by myself and Tuuli and Carlos, after my run through the tunnels. Now I had the computer play them back aloud, followed by my phone conversation with Thomas. When it was over, Butzburger was in shock.
"Tuuli's recorded statement wasn't complete," I said. "Mr. Butzburger, my wife is a Laplander, and a professional psychic. She was born and grew up in Lapland, in a tough mining town in the Swedish arctic, till she was nine. After that they lived on a frontier farm in northern Finland. Her mother's lineage has a sequence of tribal shamans, and Tuuli has the talent. Mostly her clients are people in entertainment, but she's been used as a consultant on several cases by police agencies, defense attorneys, and private investigators; that's how I met her. She was in Arizona that evening, got a premonition that I was in danger, and tried to call me. I was gone. Then she called Carlos—Mr. Katagawa—and flew home. At no cost to you, I might add. At eleven that night, she showed Carlos where to park. The rest you know."
If Butzburger had backed out then, Joe would not have been happy with me. An investigator is not supposed to try dealing with a client's uncertainties. That's Joe's hat. But Butzburger had been up front with me, and I wasn't willing to put him off.
"So you think the church is . . . But assuming for some incredible reason that Lon Thomas or anyone else in the Church wanted to get rid of Ray . . ."
"Exactly," I interrupted. "Why would they abduct him at the Hideaway? I don't think the church did abduct him. What I do believe is, they're afraid we'll get evidence that he's dead. That would have a powerful negative effect on the church. And there's the matter of who or what gets Christman's fortune."
"Christman's fortune?"
"Right." I stopped there. From the way he'd said it, there was more.
"Ray Christman had no fortune."
"Oh?"
"He had no fortune. He lived in church facilities and accepted only a modest salary."
I turned to my keyboard again, dumped the memory, and called up the summary article that the Times had published a few years earlier, moving to the part on Christman funneling most of the church's disposable income into personal accounts. Butzburger shook his head. "That's a lie," he said, "the sort of thing his enemies write about him." But he didn't sound confident. He was reciting Christman's PR line, and maybe, for the first time, wondering. I shrugged.
"Could be it is." I called the backup data to the screen, where he could see it too. It looked convincing. "Meanwhile I'm using it as a working assumption. And if there's not any will—maybe even if there is one—the church would get none of the money. That could account for Thomas' concern. He may want Christman to show up alive somewhere."
Butzburger was gnawing on his lower lip. "That doesn't entirely make sense. If Ray is simply in seclusion somewhere, the Church would . . ."
"Get none of it anyway. True, as far as we know. We're short on information. What I've been doing is accumulating pieces of the puzzle. Some parts of the picture are beginning to take shape. Maybe some photographs from Oregon will give us a major key.