Read Online Until Proven Guilty by J. A. Jance - Free Book Online

strayed.”
     
    He hustled us out of the study through his apartment, as if anxious to leave the area and the subject matter behind. The apartment was something less than luxurious, but obviously Brodie didn’t believe in living in the same kind of squalor deemed appropriate for his flock.
     
    We followed him through the rest of the building. What little of the upstairs that wasn’t devoted to parsonage contained several small Sunday School rooms. Downstairs we found a commercial-style kitchen off the fellowship hall. The equipment was polished to a high gloss. The Faith Tabernacle women evidently spent far more time maintaining church facilities than they did their own homes. The fellowship hall was outfitted in the same barren style as the sanctuary. Its only furnishings consisted of two sets of splintery redwood picnic tables pushed together to form two long banks of tables.
     
    When the tour was over, Brodie ushered us back to the Penitent’s Room in the best bum’s-rush tradition. “ I need to go outside to greet people now,” he said. “Once the service starts, you will have to leave.” He gave a rueful smile lest we think him rude or inhospitable. “It’s like a Mormon temple. No one who isn’t a True Believer is allowed inside during services.”
     
    The lady with the scrub brush was kneeling in front of the little altar in the Penitent’s Room, her bucket of soapy water still beside her. She was totally immersed in prayer. We stopped nearby but she never looked up. We went back through the sanctuary under our own steam.
     
    Outside, a little flock of True Believers waited patiently for their shepherd to welcome them to worship. The women, their hair covered with either scarves or hats of some kind, dropped their eyes demurely as we passed. The men nodded without speaking, while the children maintained the same eerie silence we had noticed the day Angel Barstogi died. It was not a joyful gathering.
     
    Jeremiah stood next to a beefy man with a full red beard. He had to be Benjamin Mason. He was a big man who looked like he had spent some time on the working end of a shovel. I walked up to Jeremiah and nodded at him without speaking. There was no sense in getting him in more hot water.
     
    “Are you Mr. Mason?” I asked.
     
    “Yes,” he answered, his tone wary, uneasy.
     
    “I’m Detective Beaumont. Did you get a message to call me?”
     
    “Didn’t have a phone,” he mumbled.
     
    “Mind if we talk to you for a minute?” Reluctantly, he followed us to our car. I thumbed through some notes I’d made from the transcripts. “Brodie says you were working Friday morning?”
     
    He nodded. “That’s right.”
     
    “And you do yard work. Can you give us a list of places you worked Friday morning?”
     
    “Wait just a minute.” Suddenly he came to life. “You’ve got no right—”
     
    Peters’ hand shot out, catching Mason’s arm just above the elbow. “You wait a minute, pal. He asked you a civil question. You can answer it here, or we can take you downtown.”
     
    “Viewmont,” he said. “I was working some houses up at the north end of Viewmont over on Magnolia.”
     
    “Anybody see you?”
     
    “Dunno. Usually nobody’s home.” He mumbled the addresses and I wrote them down.
     
    “Got any I.D. on you?”
     
    His hand shook as he fumbled his wallet out of his hip pocket. When he dragged the battered piece of plastic out of its holder, the license turned out to be an Illinois one, several years out of date. The name on it was C. D. Jason. I felt a jab of excitement.
     
    “What’s the C stand for?” I asked.
     
    “Clinton,” he answered shortly.
     
    Not Charles, not Chuck, not Charlie, but Clinton. The picture matched, but the names were different. Peters took it from me and examined it. He put it in his pocket. “We’ll just take this with us,” he said easily.
     
    “But I need it to drive,” Mason protested, reaching for it.
     
    “You’d best