How Like an Angel

One

All night and most of the day they had been driving, through mountains, and desert, and now mountains again. The old car was beginning to act skittish, the driver was getting

irritable, and Quinn, to escape both, had gone to sleep in the back seat. He was awakened by the sudden shriek of brakes and Newhouser’s voice, hoarse from exhaustion and the heat and the knowledge that once more he’d made a fool of himself at the tables.

“This is it, Quinn. The end of the line.”

Quinn stirred and turned his head, expecting to find himself on one of the tree-lined streets of San Felice, with the ocean glittering in the distance like a jewel not to be touched or sold. Even before he opened his eyes he knew something was wrong. No city street was so quiet, no sea air so dry.

“Hey, Quinn. You awake?”

“Yes.”

“Well, flake off, will you? I’m in a hurry.”

Quinn looked out of the window. The scenery hadn’t changed since he’d gone to sleep. There were mountains and more mountains and still more, all covered with the same scrub oak and chaparral, manzanita and wild holly, and a few pines growing meagerly from the parched earth.

“This is nowhere,” he said. “You told me you were going to San Felice.”

“I said near San Felice.”

“How far is near?”

“Forty-five miles.”

“For the love of—”

“You must be from the East,” Newhouser said. “In California forty-five miles is near.”

“You might have told me that before I got in the car.”

“I did. You weren’t listening. You seemed pretty anxious to get out of Reno. So now you’re out. Be grateful.”

“Oh, I am,” Quinn said dryly. “You’ve satisfied my curiosity. I’ve always wondered where nowhere was.”

“Before you start beefing, listen. My turn-off to the ranch is half a mile down the road. I’m a day late getting back to work, my wife’s a hothead, I lost seven hundred in Reno and I haven’t slept for two days. Now, you want to be glad you got a ride this far or you want to put up a squawk?”

“You might have dropped me off at a truck stop where food was available.”

“You said you had no money.”

“I was figuring on a small loan, say five bucks.”

“If I had five bucks I’d still be in Reno. You know that. You got the disease same as I have.”

Quinn didn’t deny it. “O.K., forget about money. I have another idea. Maybe that wife of yours isn’t such a hothead after all. Maybe she wouldn’t object to a temporary guest—all right, all right, it was just a suggestion. Do you have a better one?”

“Naturally, or I wouldn’t have stopped here. See that dirt road down the line?”

When Quinn got out of the car he saw a narrow lane that meandered off into a grove of young eucalyptus trees. “It doesn’t look like much of a road.”

“It’s not supposed to. The people who live at the end of it don’t like to advertise the fact. Let’s just say they’re peculiar.”

“Let’s just ask how peculiar?”

“Oh, they’re harmless, don’t worry about that. And they’re always good for a handout to the poor.” Newhouser pushed his ten-gallon hat back, revealing a strip of pure white forehead that looked painted across the top of his brown leathery face. “Listen, Quinn, I hate like the devil to leave you here but I have no choice and I know you’ll make out all right. You’re young and healthy.”

“Also hungry and thirsty.”

“You can pick up something to eat and drink at the Tower and then hitch another ride right into San Felice.”

“The Tower,” Quinn repeated. “Is that what’s at the end of the quote road unquote?”

“Yes.”

“Is it a ranch?”

“They do some ranching,” Newhouser said cautiously. “It’s a—well, sort of a self-contained little community. So I’ve heard. I’ve never seen it personally.”

“Why not?”

“They don’t encourage visitors.”

“Then how come you’re so sure I’ll get a big welcome?”

“You’re a poor sinner.”

“You mean it’s a religious outfit?”

Newhouser moved his head but Quinn wasn’t sure whether he was indicating affirmation or denial. “I tell you, I never saw the place, I just heard things about it. Some rich old dame who was afraid she was going to die built a five-story tower. Maybe she thought she’d have a shorter hitch to heaven when her time came, a head start, like. Well, I’ve got to be on my way now, Quinn.”

“Wait,” Quinn said urgently. “Be reasonable. I’m on my way to San Felice to collect three hundred bucks a friend of mine owes me. I promise to give you fifty if you’ll drive me to—”

“I can’t.”

“That’s more than a buck a mile.”

“Sorry.”

Quinn stood on the side of the road and watched Newhouser’s car disappear around a curve. When the sound of its engine died out, there was absolute silence. Not a bird chirped, not a branch swished in the wind. It was an experience Quinn had never had before and he wondered for a minute if he’d suddenly gone deaf from hunger and lack of sleep and the heat of the sun.

He had never much liked the sound of his own voice but it seemed very good to him then, he wanted to hear more, to spread it out and fill the silence.

“My name is Joe Quinn. Joseph Rudyard Quinn, but I don’t tell anyone about the Rudyard. Yesterday I was in Reno. I had a job, a car, clothes, a girlfriend. Today I’m in the middle of nowhere with nothing and nobody.”

He’d been in jams before but they’d always involved people, friends to confide in, strangers to persuade. He prided himself on being a glib talker. Now it no longer mattered, there wasn’t anyone around to listen. He could talk himself to death in that wilderness without causing a leaf to stir or an insect to scurry out of range.

He took out a handkerchief and dabbed at the sweat that was trickling down behind his ears. Although he’d often visited the city of San Felice, he knew nothing about this bleak mountainous back country, seared by the sun in summer, eroded by the winter rains. It was summer now. In the river beds dust lay, and the bones of small animals which had come to find water.

The silence, more than the heat and desolation, bothered Quinn. It seemed unnatural not even to hear a bird call, and he wondered whether all the birds had died in the long drought or whether they’d moved on to be nearer a water supply, to the ranch where Newhouser worked, or perhaps to the Tower. He glanced across the road at the narrow lane that seemed to end suddenly in the grove of eucalyptus.

“Hell, a little religion’s not going to kill me,” he said, and crossed the road, squinting against the sun.

Beyond the eucalyptus trees the path started to climb, and signs of life became evident as he followed it. He passed a small herd of cows grazing, some sheep enclosed in a pen made of logs, a couple of goats tethered in the shade of a wild holly tree, an irrigation ditch with a little sluggish water at the bottom. All the animals looked well-fed and well-tended.

The ascent became steeper as he walked, and the trees denser and taller, pines and live oaks, madrones and cotoneaster. He had almost reached the top of a knoll when he came across the first building. It was so skillfully constructed that he was only fifteen or twenty yards away before he realized it was there, a long low structure made of logs and native stone. It bore no resemblance to a tower and he thought Newhouser might have made a mistake about the place, had been taken in by local rumors and exaggerations.

There was no one in sight, and no smoke coming out of the wide stone chimney. Crude half-log shutters were fastened over the windows on the outside as if the builder’s idea had been to keep people in rather than to protect the place against intruders. With the huge sugar pines filtering the sunlight, the air seemed to Quinn suddenly cool and damp. Pine needles and orange-colored flakes of madrone bark muffled the sound of his footsteps as he approached.

Through a chink between the half-logs Brother Tongue of Prophets saw the stranger coming and began making small animal noises of distress.

“Now what are you making a fuss about?” Sister Blessing said briskly. “Here, let me see for myself.” She took his place at the chink. “It’s only a man. Don’t get excited. His car probably broke down, Brother Crown of Thorns will help him fix it, and that will end the incident. Unless—”

It was part of Sister Blessing’s nature to look for silver linings, find them, point them out to other people, and then ruin the whole effect by adding unless.

“—unless he’s from the school board or one of the newspapers. In which case I shall deal firmly with him and send him on his way, wrapped in his original ignorance. It seems a bit early, though, for the school board to start harassing us about the fall term.”

Brother Tongue nodded agreement and nervously stroked the neck of the parakeet perched on his forefinger.

“So he’s probably a newspaperman. Unless he’s another plain ordinary tramp. In which case I shall treat him with dispassionate kindness. There certainly isn’t anything to get excited about, we’ve had tramps before, as you well know. Stop making those noises. You can talk if you want to, if you have to. Suppose the building caught on fire, you could yell ‘fire,’ couldn’t you?”

Brother Tongue shook his head.

“Nonsense, I know better. Fire. Say it. Go on. Fire.”

Brother Tongue stared mutely down at the floor. If the place caught on fire he wouldn’t give the alarm, he wouldn’t say a word. He’d just stand and watch it burn, making sure first that the parakeet was safe.

Quinn knocked on the unpainted wooden door. “Hello. Is anyone here? I’ve lost my way, I’m hungry and thirsty.”

The door opened slowly, with a squawk of unoiled hinges, and a woman stepped out on the threshold. She was about fifty, tall and strong-looking, with a round face and very shiny red cheeks. She was barefooted. The long loose robe she wore reminded Quinn of the muu-muus he’d seen on the women in Hawaii except that the muu-muus were bright with color and the woman’s robe was made of coarse gray wool without ornament of any kind.

“Welcome, stranger,” she said, and though the words were kind, her tone was wary.

“I’m sorry to bother you, madam.”

“Sister, if you please. Sister Blessing of the Salvation. So you’re hungry and thirsty and you’ve lost your way, is that it?”

“More or less. It’s a long story.”

“Such stories usually are,” she said dryly. “Come inside. We never turn away the poor, being poor ourselves.”

“Thank you.”

“Just mind your manners, that’s all we ask. How long since you’ve eaten?”

“I don’t recall exactly.”

“So you’ve been on a bender, eh?”

“Not the kind you mean. But I guess you’d have to call it a bender. It bent me.”

She glanced sharply at the tweed jacket Quinn was carrying over his arm. “I know a fine piece of wool when I see it, since we weave all our own cloth. Where’d you get this?”

“I bought it.”

She seemed a little disappointed as if she had hoped he would say he had stolen it. “You don’t look or act like a beggar to me.”

“I haven’t been one very long. I don’t have the knack of it yet.”

“Don’t get sarcastic with me. I have to check up on our visitors, in self-protection. Every now and then some prying reporter comes along, or a member of the law bent on mischief.”

“I’m bent only on food and water.”

“Come in, then.”

Quinn followed her inside. It was a single room with a stone floor that looked as if it had just been scrubbed. The biggest skylight Quinn had ever seen provided the place with light.

Sister Blessing saw him staring up at it and said, “If light is to come from heaven, according to the Master, let it come directly, not slanting in through windows.”

A wooden table with benches along each side ran almost the entire length of the building. It was set with tin plates, stainless steel spoons, knives and forks, and several kerosene lamps, already cleaned and fueled for the night. At the far end of the room there was an old-fashioned icebox, a woodstove with a pile of neatly cut logs beside it, and a bird cage obviously made by an amateur. In front of the stove a man, middle-aged, thin and pale-faced, sat in a rocking chair with a bird on his shoulder. He wore the same kind of robe as Sister Blessing and he, too, was barefooted. His head was shaved and his scalp showed little nicks and scratches as if whoever had wielded the razor had bad eyes and a dull blade.

Sister Blessing closed the door. Her suspicions of Quinn seemed to be allayed for the time being and her manner now was more that of a hostess. “This is our communal eating room. And that is Brother Tongue of Prophets. The others are all at prayer in the Tower, but I’m the nurse, I must stay with Brother Tongue. He’s been sickly, I keep him by the stove at night. How are you feeling now, Brother Tongue?”

The Brother nodded and smiled, while the little bird pecked gently at his ear.

“A most unfortunate choice of names,” Sister Blessing added to Quinn in a whisper. “He seldom speaks. But then, perhaps prophets are better off not speaking too much. You may sit down, Mr.—?”

“Quinn.”

“Quinn. Rhymes with sin. It could be a bad omen.”

Quinn started to point out that it also rhymed with grin, spin, fin, but Sister Blessing replied brusquely that sin was by far the most obvious.

“I gather sin is what brought a young, able-bodied man like you to such a low estate?”

Quinn remembered what Newhouser had said about the people at the Tower, that they were especially hospitable to poor sinners. “I’m afraid so.”

“Drinking?”

“Of course.”

“Gambling?”

“Frequently.”

“Womanizing?”

“On occasion.”

“I thought so,” Sister Blessing said with gloomy satisfaction. “Well, I’ll make you a cheese sandwich.”

“Thank you.”

“With ham. There are rumors in town we don’t eat meat. What nonsense. We work hard. We need meat to keep going. A ham and cheese sandwich for you, too, Brother Tongue? A drop of goat’s milk?”

The Brother shook his head.

“Well, I can’t force you to eat. But I can at least see that you get some fresh air. It’s cool enough now to sit outside for a while. Put your little bird back in his cage and Mr. Quinn will help you with your chair.”

Sister Blessing gave orders as if there was no doubt in her mind that they would be carried out promptly and properly. Quinn took the rocking chair outside while Brother Tongue returned the parakeet to its cage and Sister Blessing started to prepare some sandwiches. In spite of her strange clothes and surroundings she gave the impression of an ordinary housewife working in her own kitchen, pleased to be of service. Quinn didn’t even try to guess what combination of circumstances had brought her to a place like the Tower.

She sat down on the bench opposite him and watched him eat. “Who told you about us, Mr. Quinn?”

“A man I hitched a ride with, he’s a hand on a ranch near here.”

“That sounds plausible.”

“It should. It’s true.”

“Where do you come from?”

“First or last?” Quinn said.

“Either, perhaps both.”

“I was born in Detroit and the last place I lived was Reno.”

“A wicked place, Reno.”

“At the moment I’m inclined to agree with you.”

Sister Blessing gave a little grunt of disapproval. “I assume that you were, as they say in the vernacular, taken to the cleaners?”

“Thoroughly.”

“Did you have a job in Reno?”

“I was a security officer at one of the clubs. Or a casino cop, however you want to put it. I still have a detective’s license in Nevada but it probably won’t be renewed.”

“You were fired from your job?”

“Let’s just say I was warned not to mix business with pleasure and I didn’t get the message in time.” Quinn started on the second sandwich. The bread was homemade and quite stale, but the cheese and ham were good and the butter sweet.

“How old are you, Mr. Quinn?”

“Thirty-five, thirty-six. Thirty-six, I guess.”

“Most men your age are at home with their wives and families, not skittering about the mountainside looking for a handout ... So you’re thirty-six. Now what? Are you going to start your life all over again, on a higher plane?”

Quinn stared at her across the table. “Look, Sister, I appreciate the food and hospitality, but I may as well make it clear that I’m not a candidate for conversion.”

“Dear me, I wasn’t thinking of that at all, Mr. Quinn. We don’t go out seeking converts. No, they come to us. When they weary of the world they come to us.”

“Then what happens?”

“We prepare them for their ascension of the Tower. There are five levels. The bottom one, where we all begin, is the earth level. The second is the level of the trees, the third mountains, the fourth sky, and fifth is the Tower of Heaven where the Master lives. I’ve never gotten beyond the third level myself. In fact” — she leaned confidentially toward Quinn, frowning — “I have some difficulty staying there, even.”

“Now why is that?”

“It’s because of the spiritual vibrations. I don’t feel them properly. Or when I do feel them it turns out there’s a jet plane overhead, or something’s exploded, and the vibrations aren’t spiritual at all. Once a tree fell, and I thought I was having the best vibrations ever. I was bitterly disappointed.”

Quinn attempted to look sympathetic. “That’s too bad.”

“Oh, you don’t really think so.”

“But I do.”

“No. I can tell. Skeptics always get a certain twist to their mouths.”

“I have a piece of ham caught in my front tooth.”

Before she covered her mouth with her hand, a little giggle escaped. She seemed flustered by the sound of it, as if it were a frivolous memento of the past she thought she’d left behind.

She got up and walked over to the icebox. “Shall I pour you some goat’s milk? It’s very nourishing.”

“No, thank you. A cup of coffee would be—”

“We never use stimulants.”

“Maybe you should try. Your vibrations might improve.”

“I must ask you to be more respectful, Mr. Quinn.”

“Sorry. The good food has made me a little light-headed.”

“Oh, it wasn’t that good.”

“I insist it was.”

“Well, I admit the cheese isn’t so bad. Brother Behold the Vision makes it from a secret recipe.”

“Please congratulate him for me.” Quinn rose, stretched, and concealed a yawn. “Now I’d better be on my way.”

“Where?”

“San Felice.”

“It’s almost fifty miles. How will you get there?”

“Walk back to the road and hitch another ride,”

“You won’t find many cars. Most people going to San Felice prefer to take the long way around, by the main highway. And once the sun goes down, cars aren’t so likely to stop for a hitchhiker, especially in the mountains. Also, the nights are very cold.”

Quinn studied her for a minute. “What’s on your mind, Sister?”

“Why, nothing. I mean, I’m concerned with your welfare. Alone in the mountains on a cold night, with no shelter, and wild animals roaming about—”

“What are you leading up to?”

“Well, it occurred to me,” she said carefully, “that we might find a simpler solution. Tomorrow morning Brother Crown of Thorns will probably be driving the truck to San Felice. Something’s gone wrong with our tractor and Brother Crown has to buy some new parts. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if you rode along with him.”

“You’re very kind.”

“Nonsense,” she said with a frown, “it’s pure selfishness on my part. I don’t want to lie awake worrying about a tenderfoot wandering loose around the mountains... We have a storage shed you can sleep in. There’s a cot in it, and a couple of blankets.”

“Are you always this hospitable to strangers, Sister?”

“No, we’re not,” she said sharply. “We get thieves, vandals, drunkards. We handle them as they deserve.”

“How is it I get the royal treatment?”

“Oh, it’s not very royal, as you will find out when you try sleeping on that cot. But it’s the best we can offer.”

From somewhere nearby a gong began to ring.

“Prayers are over,” Sister Blessing said. For a few seconds she stood absolutely still, her right hand touching her forehead. “There. Well, we’d better get out of the kitchen now. Sister Contrition will be coming to start the fire for supper and it makes her nervous to have a stranger around.”

“What about the others?”

“Each Brother and Sister has a special task until sundown.”

“What I meant was, how do the others feel about having a stranger around?”

“You will be treated with courtesy, Mr. Quinn, to the extent that you display it yourself. Poor Sister Contrition has many problems, it might be wise to avoid her. It’s the schools. She has three children and the authorities keep insisting she send them to school. And what would they learn in school, I ask you, that the Master can’t teach them here if it’s fit to learn?”

“It’s a subject I’m not prepared to take sides on, Sister.”

“You know, for a minute when I first saw you, I thought you might be one of the school authorities.”

“I’m flattered.”

“You needn’t be,” Sister Blessing said brusquely. “They’re an officious, thick-headed lot. And the trouble they’ve caused poor Sister Contrition you wouldn’t believe. It’s no wonder she has as much difficulty with spiritual vibrations as I have.”

Quinn followed her outside. Brother Tongue of Prophets was dozing in his rocking chair under a madrone tree, little patches of sunlight glistening on his shaved head.

A short broad-shouldered woman came around the side of the building followed by a boy about eight, a girl a year or so older, and a young woman of sixteen or seventeen. They wore identical gray wool robes except that those of the two younger children reached just below the knees.

They went silently into the communal eating room, with only the young woman giving Quinn a brief questioning glance. Quinn returned the glance. The girl was pretty, with brilliant brown eyes and black wavy hair, but her skin was blotched with pimples.

“Sister Karma,” Sister Blessing said. “The poor girl has acne, no amount of prayer seems to help. Come along, and I’ll show you where you’re to sleep. You won’t be comfortable but then neither are we. Indulge the flesh, weaken the spirit. That’s what you’ve always done, no doubt?”

“No doubt at all.”

“Doesn’t it worry you? Aren’t you afraid of what’s coming?”

Quinn was more afraid of what might not be coming, money and a job. But all he said was, “I try not to worry about it.”

“You must worry, Mr. Quinn.”

“Very well, Sister, I will begin now.”

“You’re joking again, aren’t you? You’re a very peculiar young man.” She looked down at her gray robe and at her bare feet, wide and flat and calloused. “I suppose I must seem peculiar to you, too. Be that as it may. I would rather seem peculiar in this world than in the next.” She added, “Amen,” as if to close the subject.

From the outside the storage room appeared to be a small replica of the other building. But inside, it was divided into compartments, each of them padlocked. One of the compartments had a small window and was furnished with a narrow iron cot with a thin gray mattress and a couple of blankets partially eaten by moths. Quinn felt the mattress with both hands. It was soft but without resilience.

“Hair,” Sister Blessing said. “The Brothers’ hair. It was an experiment on the part of Sister Glory of the Ascension, she’s very thrifty. Unfortunately, it attracts fleas. Are you susceptible to fleas?”

“I’m susceptible to a lot of things, fleas are probably included.”

“Then I’ll have Brother Light of the Infinite dose the mattress with sheep dip. First, you’d better test your susceptibility, though.”

“How do I do that?”

“Sit down and stay still for a few minutes.”

Quinn sat down on the cot and waited.

“Are you being bitten?” Sister Blessing said, after a time.

“I don’t think so.”

“Well, do you feel anything?”

“Not even a vibration.”

“Perhaps we won’t bother with the sheep dip, then. You might not like the smell, and poor Brother Light of the Infinite has enough to do.”

“As a matter of curiosity,” Quinn said, “how many people live here at the Tower?”

“Twenty-seven, right now. At one time there were nearly eighty, but some have strayed, some have died, some have lost faith. Now and then a new convert comes to us, perhaps just casually appears on the doorstep as you did... Has it occurred to you that the Lord might have guided your footsteps here?”

“No.”

“Think about it.”

“I don’t have to. I know how I got here. This man, Newhouser, picked me up in Reno, said he was going to San Felice. That’s what I understood anyway, but it turned out he meant —oh well, it doesn’t matter.”

“It matters to me,” Sister Blessing said.

“How?”

“It’s a very odd thing that you should turn out to have a detective’s license. I can’t believe it’s a coincidence. I have a feeling in my bones that it was the will of Lord.”

“Your vibrations must be improving, Sister.”

“Yes, I think so,” she said earnestly. “I think they are.”

“Now if you don’t mind telling me what my being a detective has to do with—”

“I haven’t time right now. I must go and inform the Master that you’re here. He doesn’t like surprises, especially at mealtimes. He has a weak stomach.”

“Let me go with you,” Quinn said, getting up from the cot.

“Oh no, I couldn’t. Strangers aren’t allowed in the Tower.”

“Well, would any of the Brothers and Sisters object if I wandered around a little?”

“Some will, some won’t. Although all of us here are dedicated to a common cause, we have as many personality differences as you find in other places.”

“In brief, I’m to stay here. Is that it?”

“You look tired, a little rest will do you good.” Sister Blessing went out and closed the door firmly behind her.

Quinn lay down on the cot, rubbing his chin. He needed a shave, a shower, a drink. Or a drink, a shower, a shave. He dozed off trying to make up his mind about the exact order and dreamed he was back in his hotel room in Reno. He’d won ten thousand dollars and he didn’t notice until he spread it out on the bed to count that the bills were all fives and all bore a picture of Sister Blessing instead of Lincoln.

It was still daylight when he awoke, sweating and confused. It took him a minute to remember where he was, the little room looked like a prison.

Someone pounded on the door and Quinn sat up. “Who is it?”

“Brother Light of the Infinite. I’ve come about the mattress.”

“Mattress?”

The door opened and Brother Light of the Infinite entered the room, carrying a gallon tin can. He was a big man with a face crisscrossed with lines like an old paper bag. His robe was dirty and smelled, not unpleasantly, of livestock.

Quinn said, “This is very kind of you, Brother.”

“Ain’t kindness. Orders. Me with a hundred things to do and that woman can think of a hundred more. Go fix the mattress, she says. Can’t let the stranger get all bit up, says she, so here I am wasting my time on fleas. You all bit up?”

“I don’t think so.”

Brother Light put the can of sheep dip on the floor. “Take off your shirt and look at your belly. They like bellies, the skin’s softer, easier to get their teeth into.”

“While I’m undressing, is there any chance of a shower around here?”

“There’s water in the washroom, can’t call it a shower exactly... Why, you ain’t even bit. Must have a hide like an elephant. No use wasting this stuff on you.” He picked the can up again and started toward the door.

“Wait a minute,” Quinn said. “Where’s the washroom?”

“Off to the left a piece.”

“I don’t suppose you have a razor?”

Brother Light fingered his shaved scalp which bore numerous nicks and scratches like Brother Tongue’s. “We got razors, you think I was born this way? Only today’s not shaving day.”

“It is for me.”

“You take it up with Brother of the Steady Heart, he’s the barber. Don’t come bothering me, with all the things I got to do, cows to be milked, goats to be watered, chickens to be fed.”

“Sorry to have put you to any trouble.”

As he left, Brother Light banged the can of sheep dip against the door frame to indicate his low opinion of apologies.

Quinn, too, went outside, carrying his shirt and tie. He guessed, from the position of the sun, that it was between six and seven o’clock and that he’d slept for a couple of hours.

From the chimney of the communal dining room smoke billowed and the smell of it mingled with the smell of meat cooking and pine needles. The air was crisp and cool. It seemed to Quinn very healthful air and he wondered whether it had cured the rich old lady who’d built the Tower or whether she had died here, a step closer to heaven. As for the Tower itself, he still hadn’t seen it and the only indication he’d had that it actually existed had been the gong sounding the termination of prayers. He would have liked to wander around the place and find the Tower for himself but Brother Light’s attitude made him doubt the wisdom of this. The others might be even less friendly.

In the washroom he pumped water into a pail by hand. It was cold and murky, and the gray gritty bar of homemade soap resisted Quinn’s attempt to work up a lather. He looked around for a razor. Even if he had found one it wouldn’t have done much good, since the washroom contained no mirror. Perhaps the sect had a religious taboo against mirrors. That would account for the necessity of having Brother of the Steady Heart act as barber.

While he was washing and dressing, he considered Sister Blessing’s remarks about the Lord guiding his footsteps to the Tower. She’s got bats in the belfry, he thought. Which is fine with me unless one of them flies out and bites me.

When he went back outside, the sun was setting and the mountains had turned from dark green to violet. Two Brothers passed him on their way to the washroom, bowed their heads briefly and silently, and went on. Quinn heard the clinking of metal dishes and the sounds of voices coming from the dining room and he started toward it. He was halfway there when he heard Sister Blessing calling his name.

She came hurrying toward him, her robe flapping in the wind, hike a bat’s wings, he thought, without amusement.

She was carrying a couple of candles and a package of wooden matches. “Mr. Quinn? Yoohoo, Mr. Quinn.”

“Hello, Sister. I was just going to look for you.”

She was flushed and out of breath. “I’ve made a terrible mistake. I forgot this was the Day of Renunciation, I was so busy getting Brother Tongue settled back in his own quarters in the Tower. He’s well enough now not to need the heat of the stove at night.”

“Take a minute to catch your breath, Sister.”

“Yes, I must. I’m so flustered, the Master’s stomach is bothering him again.”

“And?”

“This being the Day of Renunciation, we can’t eat with a stranger among us because of—dear me, I’ve forgotten the reason, but anyhow it’s a rule.”

“I’m not very hungry anyway,” Quinn lied politely.

“Oh, you’ll be fed, have no doubt of that. It’s just that you’ll have to wait until the others are through. It will take an hour, perhaps longer, depending on poor Brother Behold the Vision’s teeth. They don’t fit very well and he gets behind the others. It taxes Brother Light’s patience since he works in the fields all day and has a manly appetite. You don’t mind waiting?”

“Not at all.”

“I’ve brought you candles and matches. And look what else.” From the folds of her robe she produced a dog-eared book. “Something to read,” she said with an air of triumph. “We’re not allowed books except about the Faith but this is from one year when Sister Karma had to go to school. It’s about dinosaurs. Do you think that will interest you?”

“Oh yes. Highly.”

“I’ve read it myself dozens of times. I’m practically an expert on dinosaurs by this time. Promise you won’t tell anyone I gave it to you?”

“I promise.”

“I’ll let you know when the others have finished eating.”

“Thank you, Sister.”

Quinn could tell from the way she handled the book that it was something very precious to her and that it was a sacrifice on her part to lend it to him. He was touched by her gesture but also a little suspicious of it: Why me? Why do I get the special treatment? What does she want from me?

Back in the storage shed he lit the two candles, sat down on the cot and tried to make some plans for the future. First he would hitch a ride in the truck with Brother Crown as far as San Felice. Then he would drop in on Tom Jurgensen and collect his three-hundred dollars. After that—

After that no plans were necessary. He knew all too well what would happen. If he scraped together enough money he’d go back to Reno. If he couldn’t make Reno, Las Vegas. If he couldn’t get to Las Vegas, one of the poker parlors outside Los Angeles. A job, money; a game, no money. Every time he ran around the circle, the grooves got deeper. He knew he’d have to break out of it some time. Maybe this was it.

All right, he told himself, he’d get a job in San Felice where the only gambling was bingo at the country club once a week. He’d save some money, mail a check for his back rent to the hotel in Reno and have the clerk send on his clothes and the rest of the things he’d left as security. He might even, if everything turned out well, ask Doris to join him... No, Doris was part of the circle. Like most of the other people who worked at the clubs, she spent her off-hours at the tables. Some of them had their whole lives under one roof; they slept, ate, worked and played there, with as much single-minded dedication as the Brothers and Sisters of the Tower.

Doris. It was only twenty-four hours since he’d said goodbye to her. She’d offered to lend him money but for reasons he wasn’t sure of, either then or now, he’d refused. Maybe he turned it down because he knew money had strings attached, no matter how carefully they were camouflaged. He looked down at the book Sister Blessing had given to him and he wondered what strings were attached to it.

“Mr. Quinn?”

He got up and opened the door. “Come in, Sister. Did you have a good Renunciation Day dinner?”

Sister Blessing glanced at him suspiciously. “Good enough, considering the troubled state of Sister Contrition’s mind.”

“Just what is one supposed to renounce? Not food, I gather.”

“None of your business, Come along now and no smart talking. The dining room’s empty and I have your lamb stew heated up and a nice cup of cocoa.”

“I thought you didn’t believe in stimulants.”

“Cocoa is not a true stimulant. We had a meeting of the Council about that last year, and it was decided by a large majority that cocoa, because it contained other important nourishment, is quite permissible. Only Sister Glory of the Ascension voted no because she’s so stin—thrifty. I told you about the hair in the mattress?”

“Yes,” said Quinn, who preferred to forget it.

“You’d better hide the book. Not that anyone would spy on you, but why take a chance?”

“Why, indeed.” He covered the book with a blanket.

“Have you read it?”

“Some.”

“Don’t you think it’s very interesting?”

Quinn thought the strings attached to it might be more interesting but he didn’t say so.

They went outside. An almost full moon hung low in the redwood trees. Stars studded the sky, hundreds more than Quinn had even seen, and even while he stood and watched, still more appeared.

“Haven’t you ever seen a sky before?” Sister Blessing said with a touch of impatience.

“Not this one.”

“It’s the same as always.”

“It looks different to me.”

Sister Blessing peered anxiously up into his face. “Do you suppose you’re having a religious experience?”

“I am admiring the universe,” Quinn said. “If you want to put a tag on it, go ahead.”

“You don’t understand, Mr. Quinn. I prefer that you not have a religious experience right at the moment.”

“Why?”

“It would be very inconvenient. I have something I want you to do for me and a conversion at this time would interfere.”

“You can stop worrying, Sister. Now, about this something you want me to do—”

“I’ll tell you later, when you’ve eaten.”

The dining room was empty, and Brother Tongue’s rocking chair was gone and so was the bird cage. One place was set at the end of the table nearest the stove.

Quinn sat down and Sister Blessing filled a tin plate with lamb stew and another with thick slices of bread. As she had in the afternoon, she watched Quinn eat with a kind of maternal interest.

“Your color’s not very good,” she said, after a time. “But you have a hearty appetite and you seem healthy enough. What I mean is, if you were frail, I naturally couldn’t ask you to do me any favors.”

“Contrary to appearances, I am extremely frail. I have a bad liver, weak chest, poor circulation—”

“Nonsense.”

“All right, what’s the favor?”

“I want you to find somebody for me. Not find him in person, exactly, but find out what happened to him. You understand?”

“Not yet.”

“Before I go on, I’d like to make one thing clear: I can pay you, I have money. Nobody around here knows about it because we all renounce our worldly possessions when we come to the Tower. Our money, our very clothes on our backs, everything goes into the common fund.”

“But you kept something of your own in case of emergency?”

“Nothing of the kind,” she said sharply. “My son in Chicago sends me a twenty-dollar bill every Christmas with the understanding that I hold on to it for myself and not give it to the Master. My son doesn’t approve of all this.” She gestured vaguely around the room. “He doesn’t understand the satisfactions of a life of service to the Lord and His True Believers. He thinks I went a little crazy when my husband died, and maybe I did. But I’ve found my real place in the world now, I will never leave. How can I? I am needed. Brother Tongue with his pleurisy attacks, the Master’s weak stomach, Mother Pureza’s heart—she is the Master’s wife and very old.”

Sister Blessing got up and stood in front of the stove, rubbing her hands together as if she’d felt the sudden chill of death in the air.

“I’m getting old myself,” she said. “Some of the days are hard to face. My soul is at peace but my body rebels. It longs for some softness, some warmth, some sweetness. Mornings when I get out of bed my spirit feels a touch of heaven, but my feet—oh, the coldness of them, and the aches in my legs. Once in a Sears catalogue I saw a picture of a pair of slippers. I often think of them, though I shouldn’t. They were pink and furry and soft and warm, they were the most beautiful slippers I ever did see, but of course an indulgence of the flesh.”

“A very small one, surely?”

“They’re the ones you have to watch out for. They grow, grow like weeds. You get warm slippers and pretty soon you’re wanting other things.”

“Such as?”

“A hot bath in a real bathtub, with two towels. There, you see?” she said, turning to Quinn. “It’s happening already. Two towels I asked for, when one would be plenty. It proves my point about human nature—nothing is ever enough. If I had a hot bath, I would want another, and then one a week or even one every day. And if everyone at the Tower did the same we’d all be lolling around in hot baths while the cattle starved and the garden went to weeds. No, Mr. Quinn, if you offered me a hot bath right this minute I’d have to refuse it.”

Quinn wanted to point out that he wasn’t in the habit of offering hot baths to strange women but he was afraid of hurting the Sister’s feelings. She was as earnest and intense about the subject as if she were arguing with the devil himself.

After a time she said, “Have you heard of a place called Chicote? It’s a small city in the Central Valley, a hundred miles or so from here.”

“I know where it is, Sister.”

“I would like you to go there and find a man named Patrick O’Gorman.”

“An old friend of yours? A relative?”

She didn’t seem to hear the question. “I have a hundred and twenty dollars.”

“That’s a lot of fuzzy pink slippers, Sister.”

Again she made no response. “It may be quite a simple job, I don’t know.”

“Suppose I find O’Gorman, what then? Do I give him a message? Wish him a happy Fourth of July?”

“You do nothing at all, except come back here and tell me about it, me and only me.”

“What if he’s no longer living in Chicote?”

“Find out where he went. But please don’t try to contact him, no purpose would be served and mischief could be done. Will you accept the job?”

“I’m in no position to pick and choose at the moment, Sister. I must remind you, though, that you’re taking quite a risk sending me away from here with a hundred and twenty dollars. I might not come back.”

“You might not,” she said calmly. “In which case I will have learned another lesson. But then again you might come back, so I have nothing to lose but money I can’t spend anyway and can’t give to the Master because of my promise to my son.”

“You have a trick of making everything seem very reasonable on first examination.”

“And on second?”

“I wonder why you’re interested in O’Gorman.”

“Wonder a little. It won’t do you any harm. I will tell you only that what I’ve asked you to do is highly important to me,”

“All right. Where’s the money?”

“In a good safe place,” Sister Blessing said blandly, “until tomorrow morning.”

“Meaning you don’t trust me? Or you don’t trust the Brothers and Sisters?”

“Meaning I’m no fool, Mr. Quinn. You’ll get the money when you’re sitting in that truck beside Brother Crown of Thorns at dawn tomorrow.”

“Dawn?”

“Early to bed and early to rise puts color in the cheeks and sparkle in the eyes.”

“That isn’t how I heard it.”

“The Master has made certain changes in the proverbs to make them suitable for our children to learn.”

“I’m curious about the Master,” Quinn said. “I’d like to meet him.”

“He’s indisposed tonight. Perhaps when you come to visit us again—”

“You seem pretty sure I’ll be coming back, Sister. Maybe you don’t know about gamblers.”

“I knew about gamblers,” Sister Blessing said, “long before you saw your first ace of spades.”