“The police should have consulted you instead of me, Georg.”
Dr. Poblocki shrugged. “I don’t have a museum.” To Evie he said, “Your uncle was my student at Yale before he started working for the government.”
“That was a long time ago.” Will tapped the page. “Tell me more about this Pentacle of the Beast, Georg. What is it? What does it mean?”
“It is the sacred emblem of the Brethren, a vanished religious cult in upstate New York.”
“I forget New York even has an upstate. Seems unnecessary after Manhattan,” Evie quipped.
“Delightful!” Dr. Poblocki smiled. “I like this one.”
“The Brethren?” Will prompted as if waiting out an unruly student.
“The Most Holy Covenant of the Brethren of God. They were formed during the Second Great Awakening, in the early nineteenth century.”
“The second what?” Evie asked.
“The Second Great Awakening was a time when religious fervor gripped the nation. Preachers would cross the country giving fiery sermons about hellfire and damnation, warning of the Devil’s temptations while saving souls during revivals and tent meetings,” Dr. Poblocki said, slipping into the sort of lecturing mode Evie imagined he used with his students. “It gave rise to new religions such as the Church of Latter-Day Saints, the Church of Christ, and the Seventh-Day Adventists, as well as this one.” Dr. Poblocki tapped the book with his finger. “The Brethren was formed by a young preacher named John Joseph Algoode. Reverend Algoode was tending sheep—very biblical, that—when he saw a great fire in the sky. It was Solomon’s Comet coming through the northern hemisphere.”
Evie suddenly remembered the two girls handing her the flyer on the street. “The same Solomon’s Comet…”
“On its way to us now in its fifty-year return. Indeed.” Dr. Poblocki finished. He settled into a chair, wincing as he did so. “This dreadful knee of mine. Old age comes for us all, I’m afraid.”
“I’ll be old before you tell us the story, Georg,” Will pressed, and Evie felt a bit embarrassed by his rudeness.
“Your uncle. He could never wait for anything. That impatience will cost you in the end, I fear, William,” Dr. Poblocki said, peering up at Will darkly, and it seemed to Evie that her uncle looked just a bit chastened. “Pastor Algoode claimed to have had a vision: that the old churches of Europe were a corruption of God’s word. There needed to be a new American faith, he said. Only this great experiment of a country could produce believers pure and devout enough to submit wholly to God’s word and judgment. The Brethren would be that faith. They would rule the new America. The true America. They would fulfill its great promise.” Dr. Poblocki removed his glasses, fogging the lenses with his breath and wiping them clean with a cloth until he was satisfied, then settled the hooks of them over his ears again. “Pastor Algoode brought his small flock to the Catskill Mountains in 1832. They settled on fifteen acres and built a church in an old barn, where they would meet each evening for prayers by candlelight and all day on Sundays. They painted their homes and church with religious signs in accordance with their holy book, and they farmed their land. They had an odd belief system, cobbled together from the Bible—particularly Revelation—and the occult. Their Book of the Holy Brethren was believed to be part religious doctrine, part grimoire.”
“Grimoire?” Evie said.
“A book of sorcery,” Dr. Poblocki explained.
“That explains the sigils, I suppose,” Will mused.
Dr. Poblocki nodded. “Indeed. There were rumors, as there always are in such cases, that the Brethren practiced everything from unsavory sexual practices to cannibalism and human sacrifice. It’s one of the reasons they were so insular and lived up in the mountains—to escape persecution. They did have extensive knowledge of hallucinogens, most likely learned from native tribes who used such things in their religious worship to achieve transcendence. The account of a French-Canadian fur trapper visiting the area tells of ‘a magnificent smoke and a sweet wine which, when consumed, cause the mind to imagine all sorts of angels and devils.’ Now. The Brethren were an eschatology cult.”
“Is that even legal?” Evie said.
“Charming lady!” Dr. Poblocki laughed and patted Evie’s hand. “Are you certain you’re related to that one?” He nodded at Will, and Evie had to fight the urge to giggle.
“Eschatology,” Dr. Poblocki continued, “from the Greek eschatos, meaning ‘the last,’ is about the end of the world and the second coming of Jesus Christ. Ah, but here is where things become quite interesting!”
Evie’s eyes widened. “More interesting than dope and sorcery?”
“Indeed! You see, the Brethren didn’t just believe that the end of the world was nigh; they thought it their God-given duty to help bring it about.”
“How did they plan to do that?” Will asked.
“By raising the anti-Christ. The Beast himself.” Dr. Poblocki paused to allow his words time to settle. Evie’s skin prickled with goose bumps.
“Why would they do that if they were Christians?” Evie asked.
“The line between faith and fanaticism is a constantly shifting one,” Dr. Poblocki said. “When does belief become justification? When does right become rationale and crusade become crime?”
“How did they intend to raise the Beast, Georg?” Will asked.
“With this.” Dr. Poblocki reached into his pile of books and produced a gnarled, leather-bound volume. “The eleven offerings. It’s a sacrificial ritual, both magical and religious in origin, for manifesting the Beast here on earth.”
The book was very old, and the thin, veined paper felt leathery against Evie’s fingers. It reminded her very much of some macabre illuminated Bible. Each page featured a small, colorful illustration of a ritual murder, accompanied by a scripture-like passage. The same sigils found on the killer’s notes also ran along the edges of the book’s entries.
Evie read the offerings aloud in order. “The Sacrifice of the Faithful. The Tribute of the Ten Servants of the Master. The Pale Horseman Riding Death Before the Stars. The Death of the Virgin. The Harlot Adorned and Cast upon the Sea…” The drawing was of a sightless, bejeweled woman arranged on water, surrounded by pearls. Above her head was an eye symbol. “Unc,” Evie said, shivering. “It’s just the way Ruta Badowski’s body was found.”
Will reached over Evie and turned to the next page. “The sixth offering, the Sacrifice of the Idle Son…” The illustration showed a boy hung upside down with one leg bent, like the Hanging Man of the tarot. The boy’s hands were missing, and a pair of hands bent in prayer was the symbol above the drawing. “Tommy Duffy.”
Evie read on. “The seventh offering, the Turning Out of the Deceitful Brethren from the Temple of Solomon.” She raised her head, thinking. “It’s a template for the murders.” She continued. “The eighth offering, the Veneration of the Angelic Herald. The ninth, the Destruction of the Golden Idol. The tenth, the Lamentation of the Widow. The eleventh offering, the Marriage of the Beast and the Woman Clothed in the Sun.”
The last page was a drawing of a bestial, horned man with the feet of a goat, two enormous wings, and a tail. He sat upon a throne and his eyes burned. In his hand was a dripping heart. At his feet was a woman wearing a golden crown and dress, her chest torn open. The symbol at the bottom was a comet. It made Evie shudder.
“Does it say how the Beast was supposed to come into this world?”
“It’s unclear. It says only that they needed a chosen one.”
“A chosen one to commit the murders?” Evie clarified.
Dr. Poblocki gave a small shrug. “There, I’m afraid, I can only conjecture.”