power, had mered their flesh to pulp, made their heads explode, and to
off the offensive sex things that preoccupied them. If he had been that
gifted, he would not have shown them any ofmercy with which their
Creator always treated them, so they would have realized, then, how
grateful and obedient they should have been to their God, who always so
patiently tolerated even their worst transgressions.
Only God and Candy’s mother had such unlimited compunsion. He did not
share it.
The smoke alarm went off in the hall. He walked out the pointed a
finger at it, and blew it to bits.
This part of his gift seemed more powerful tonight than ever. He was a
great engine of destruction.
The Lord must be rewarding his purity by increasing power.
He thanked God that his own saintly mother had never scended into the
pits of depravity in which so much of hum ity swam. No man had ever
touched her that way, so children were born without the stain of
original sin. He knew this to be true, for she had told him-and had
shown himit was.
He descended to the first floor and set the living-room carpet on fire
with a bolt from his left hand.
Frank and the twins had never appreciated the immacul aspect of their
conceptions, and in fact had thrown away incomparable state of grace to
embrace sin and do the devi work. Candy would never make that mistake.
Overhead he heard the roar of flames, the crash of a partition. In the
morning, when the sun revealed a smolderingof blackened rubble, the
remains of this nest of corruption would be a testament to the ultimate
perdition of all sinners.
Candy felt cleansed. The psychic images of the Dakotas’ fevered
degeneracy had been expunged from his mind.
He returned to the offices of Dakota & Dakota to continue his search for
them.
BOBBY DROVE, for he didn’t think Julie ought to be behind the wheel any
more tonight. She had been awake for more than nineteen hours, not a
marathon all-nighter yet, but she was exhausted; and her bottled-up
grief over Thomas’s death could not help but cloud her judgment and dull
her reflexes. At least he had napped a couple of times since Hal’s call
from the hospital had awakened them last night.
He crossed most of Santa Barbara and entered Goleta before bothering to
look for a service station where they could ask for directions to
Pacific Hill Road.
At his request, Julie opened the telephone directory on her lap, and
with the assistance of a small flashlight taken from the glove
compartment, she looked under the Fs for Fogarty. He didn’t know the
first name, but he was only interested in a male Fogarty who carried the
title of doctor.
“He might not live in this area,” Bobby said,
“but I have a hunch he does.”
“Who is he?”
“When Frank and I were traveling, we stopped in this guy’s study,
twice.” He told her about both brief visits.
“How come you didn’t mention him before?”
“At the office, when I told you what happened to me, where Frank and I
had gone, I had to condense some of it, and this Fogarty seemed
comparatively uninteresting, so I left him out. But the longer I’ve had
time to think about it, the more it seems to me that he might be a key
player in this. See, Frank popped us out of there so fast because he
seemed especially reluctant to endanger Fogarty by leading Candy to him.
If Frank’s especially concerned about the man, then we ought to have a
talk with him.” She hunched over the directory, studying it closely.
“Fogarty, James. Fogarty, Jennifer. Fogarty, Kevin..
What if he’s not a medical doctor and doesn’t use the title MD or if
‘Doc’ is a nickname, we’re in trouble. Even if he is a medical doctor,
don’t bother looking in the Yellow Pages under ‘physicians,’ because
this guy is up in years, got to be retire
“Here!” she said.
“Fogarty, Dr. Lawrence J.”
“There’s an address?”,Yes.” She tore the page out of the book.
“Great. As soon as you’ve seen the infamous Pollard pla we’ll pay