“It’s not like that. It’s really not,” Abby said under her breath. “Won’t you please hear me out?”
“I’m listening. But it better be damned good or else I’m dragging your ass to the police station.”
Abby offered a shake of her head to the bartender when he approached. Keeping her voice low, she said, “You don’t know what Sidney’s like. He’s so controlling and sometimes he… sometimes he becomes violent. I met him a few years ago after I left home. I was so bright-eyed and excited about being on my own… I was terribly naïve. I’d never been with a boy, let alone a man. And when Sidney met me at a restaurant, he seemed so smooth and so mature. I melted, Miss Cambridge, I literally did. I was like putty in his hands. He took me to his bed and molded me to be the kind of lover he wanted. I didn’t enjoy some of those things but I knew he did so I let him abuse me… and eventually, when our money problems started to hit, I let him persuade me to take a job modeling for some magazines and eventually performing at The Topaz Club. Have you heard of it?”
“Yes.”
“It’s a vile place. Men and women sit around drinking while I’m stripped naked, put in chains, sometimes whipped or violated in ways that good girls simply shouldn’t be!”
Violet snorted, “And is that what you are? A good girl?”
“Yes! I still am, despite everything.” Abby tapped the fingers of her right hand on the counter. “A few months ago, Sidney started working for a local crime boss, shaking down people who were behind in their protection payments. One of the guys Sidney was beating up offered him this horrible little statue in lieu of money. He said it was priceless. Something about it appealed to Sidney and he took it. He kept it in the apartment, in our bedroom and I could feel it watching us when we… when we would lie down together.”
“What did it look like?”
Abby glanced up. “It’s hard to describe really. It’s not very tall but it’s really heavy. It’s carved out of black rock and it… it’s always so cold to the touch. Like it was left out in the freezing rain. It’s a sculpture of a little… thing. A monster or a demon or something? I’m not even sure. It looks like… well, if you asked me to show you what madness looked like in its physical form, that would be it.”
Violet finished off her drink and waved for another one. Albert refilled her glass while Abby thought over her next words.
“Almost from the moment he brought home that horrid little thing, Sidney started to change. He became paranoid that people were after it. That they wanted to steal it and destroy it. He told me that they didn’t know who he was — not yet — but that they would soon. So he had to strike first and take them down. Kill them before they could kill him. That’s how I ended up coming to Mr. Knopf.”
“Wait… you’re saying that your boyfriend thought Miles was looking for The Damned Thing?”
“Well, yes. Sidney said he was. He said that Mr. Knopf was a member of an organization known as the Temple of Jerusalem.”
“Miles wasn’t religious.”
Abby shrugged. “Maybe Sidney was just making things up. I don’t know. But he told me to see if I couldn’t get Mr. Knopf to come and meet with him. So I made up my story and hired him.”
Violet lit a cigarette. “Parts of your story don’t hold water, sister. Even if I believe you about this all being Sidney’s idea and you being a poor girl in over her head, why in the world wouldn’t Sidney just drop in on Miles himself? Why would he need you to be the go-between? And hiring Miles so he could be ambushed makes no sense, either. I’m usually the one who goes out into the field, not Miles. You were more likely to get me than him.”
“I just did what he told me to do, Miss Cambridge.”
“Uh-huh. And is that what you’re doing right now?”
“No! He doesn’t know I’m here. I… I left him last night. We had a fight and I told him that I couldn’t take it anymore. I stormed out of his place and spent the night with a friend. I came back to get some of my things and saw you come in here. I waited for you to come back out but finally decided to follow you inside.”
“Your boyfriend’s flown the coop, too. I went inside his house earlier but there was no sign of him or of The Damned Thing.”
“He must be staying at The Topaz. He has a room there he uses sometimes.”
Violet looked over at her, studying the worry lines around the young girl’s eyes. Though still very fresh and lovely, Abby Whitehead was aging fast. Violet had been too dazzled by her the first time to notice it but upon closer examination, you could see the girl’s light being dimmed with each passing second. “You said you spent last night with a friend… where are you going next?”
Abby sighed, chewing her bottom lip so hard that Violet was afraid she was going to draw blood. “I don’t know.”
“I can put you up at my place. You’ll be safe there.”
“You’d do that for me? After all the lies I told?”
“Sure. Besides, it’s usually better to keep people you don’t trust close by.”
“Oh.”
“C’mon.” Violet paid her tab and stood up. Abby followed her outside, trailing behind like a lost little puppy.
HALF AN HOUR later and Violet was in Miles Knopf’s apartment. She’d jimmied the lock, feeling a rush of emotion upon entering. She missed him terribly. Losing Miles was almost like losing Walter all over again.
Violet had left Abby in her apartment, asking the snoopy busybody down the hall to keep an eye out for any visitors or for Abby sneaking out on her own.
Most of the apartment seemed innocuous enough. Miles had obviously read the evening newspaper before going out, leaving it roughly folded next to his favorite chair. His bedroom had an unmade bed and a pair of socks on the floor.
Every scrap of paper was looked at, however, and Violet began to realize the enormity of their financial situation. The business had been bleeding money for quite awhile and there were threats of eviction, seizure of property and public humiliation. All of these bills and letters were found in a small box under her partner’s bed.
But it was the box next to it that had most shaken Violet. She had finally sat down in the living room, the radio blaring beside her, to look through its contents. There were various medals and papers relating to his membership in something called The Sovereign Military Order of the Temple of Jerusalem. Just like Abby had said… but the organization seemed like an odd cross between a public works order and a religious one. The SMOTJ was the United States affiliated Grand Priory of something called The Ordo Supremus Militaris Templi Hierosolymitani. If that mouthful wasn’t enough, the OSMTH was, in turn, an international association of other groups, all based upon the traditions of the historically significant Knights Templar. From the looks of things, the group was focused on preserving holy sites around the world, antiquarian research, charitable works, and diplomatic lobbying and intervention.
There was a small leather-bound history book dedicated to The Order. It was dog-eared and had obviously been read many, many times. According to this, a French physician named Bernard-Raymond Fabre-Palaprat had founded the Order in 1804. Fabre-Palaprat intended for it to be a modern-day revival of the Templar tradition and he proclaimed himself the Grand Master. The group quickly became accepted in occult circles and Napoleon himself showed interested in joining.
A membership certificate showed that Miles had joined the organization in 1936, less than a year after Walter’s death. He had accepted the honorific title of Sir Knight and had been assigned to a specific division within the Atlanta branch known simply as Division 13. What exactly their duties were, or who the other members might have been, was not to be found in any of the papers.