“You don’t know what I know,” said Iron Mike. He craned his head forward to speak. Drops of blood fell from his chin and spattered on the saint’s clothes. “I know you. I know who you are, Saint John of the Knife. I know who you were before the Reaper Plague began eating the world.”
“Do you?”
The red eyes burned, and the mouth below them smiled. “I know. And even if I hadn’t heard of the serial killer named Saint John in newspapers and books, all I have to do to know you is to look into your eyes. You know the saying—the eyes are the windows of the soul. Do you want to know what I see when I look into your eyes?”
Saint John did not answer.
“You want me to tell you?” asked Mike in a tone only Saint John and Brother Marty could hear. “In front of your ‘flock’?”
The saint did not reply, but Marty raised his hand, snapped his fingers with a sound like a dry stick breaking, and waved the reapers back. He kept waving until they were well beyond earshot even of normal voices.
“You want me out of here, boss?” he asked.
Saint John nodded. “Question the last of the guards. Tear the truth from him if you must. Do it down the hill, but come when I call.”
Before he left, Brother Marty looked up into Iron Mike’s face. “You are one very spooky guy, you know that?”
“It’s come up in conversation.”
They smiled at each other for a moment.
“Be cool if you were on our side,” said Brother Marty.
Iron Mike’s smile grew cold. “I’m not on anybody’s side.”
Marty studied his eyes, then turned and moved quickly away.
When they were alone, Saint John said, “You try very hard to be impressive, Mr. Sweeney. Go ahead . . . impress me. Reveal your insights. What is it you think you know?”
“Seriously? You want to go there.”
“Seriously,” agreed the saint.
“Okay. Like I said, I know you. I look through the windows of your eyes and I know you. I can see what made you.”
“I doubt that . . .”
“I can see the little boy you used to be. The tortured one. The abused one. The humiliated one.”
“You’ll have to do better than that. Before the Fall the newspapers ran all sorts of stories speculating about me. They trotted out FBI profilers who said that I was the product of an abusive home life. All very cliché.”
“All very true.”
“You’re trying to buy your life back by teasing me with information anyone could have gotten.”
Mike slowly shook his head. “I know the secret word. . . .”
Saint John froze.
“I know what it is and where it is,” said Mike. “A word your father burned into your skin with cigarette butts. A word that he burned onto your mother’s face right before she killed herself. Do you want me to tell you what that word is?”
The saint did not reply. His mouth went dry, and his heart beat with strange rhythms.
“I know what you did to your father,” continued Iron Mike. “I know what you did to try to stop the pain. The horror. The ugliness.”
“No.”
“Yes.”