F Paul Wilson - Novel 03 (40 page)

           
 
He finishes the turn and levels off on a
circular course around the center of the eye, catching lightning-strobed
glimpses of the cyclopean thing in the heart of the storm. His copilot's and
navigator's hushed, awed voices fill the cabin.

           
 
"What in God's name
is
that?"

           
 
"I don't know."

           
 
They are at 20,000 feet and whatever it is
reaches from the ocean below and disappears into the clouds miles above them.

           
 
Densmore realizes that what he sees before him
is impossible. He knows his physics, and something that big breaks all natural
laws. Just like the storm itself.

           
 
Which means something else is driving this
storm that breaks all the rules and defies the world's most sophisticated radar
tracking system.

           
 
And God help whoever is in its way when it
makes landfall.

           
 
Suddenly he wants to be as far away as
possible from this unnatural phenomenon.

           
 
"Take some pictures so people won't think
we're all crazy, and let's get the hell out of here."

           
 
Moments later reconnaissance flight 705
reenters the eye wall but instead of flying through, it is tossed back by the
hellish fury of the tornadic winds. Densmore tries again and again to pierce
the eye wall but each time his craft is rejected like an unwanted toy.

           
 
The storm won't let them leave. They're
trapped . . . in the eye . . . with that thing . . .

           
 
Densmore resumes a circular path along the eye
wall, staying as far as possible from its center.

           
 
They're safe here in the relative calm of the
eye—safe at least from the winds—as long as their fuel holds out.

           
 
But they've only got a few hours' worth left.

           
HURRICANE
WATCH

           
 
THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE HAS

           
 
ISSUED A HURRICANE WATCH FOR SANTA

           
 
BARBARA,
VENTURA
, LOS ANGELES,

           
 
ORANGE
AND
SAN DIEGO
COUNTIES
.

           
 
BRING IN LOOSE OUTDOOR OBJECTS,

           
 
FILL UP YOUR CAR WITH GAS, AND STAY

           
 
TUNED FOR FURTHER DEVELOPMENTS.

           
 
THE WEATHER CHANNEL

           
Manhattan

           
 
Neither Father Brenner nor Mr. Kesev of the
Shin Bet wanted a drink, but Dan didn't let that stop him. Monsignor Riccio had
come by to offer his condolences. He seemed to know Kesev—apparently they'd met
on the street awhile back.

           
 
The Monsignor didn't say, "This is what
you get for recklessly going public with the Virgin," but Dan guessed he
was thinking it. He was gracious, however, and sincerely wished for the speedy
capture of the killers, then he left. Father Brenner had sat up with him
awhile, then he went to bed. Now it was just Kesev and Dan, sitting in silence.

           
 
"Sure you won't have one?" Dan said,
crossing the front room of the rectory to pour himself a third Dewar's.

           
 
"No," Kesev said, "and I do
wish you would not drink too much."

           
 
Dan stopped in mid-pour. Kesev was right. This
wouldn't do him any good. Wouldn't ease the pain, even a little. The wound was
too wide, too deep, too fresh.

           
 
"This is my last. But what's it to you?
What do you care about me or how much I drink?"

           
 
"I'm sorry for you and for that poor dead
woman. But I'm concerned for my own sake as well. You see . . . for many years
I have been the Mother's guardian."

           
 
"The Mother,'" Dan said softly.
"The Virgin. How Carrie loved her." Then the rest of Kesev's words
sank in. "Guardian? We had a fake scroll supposedly written by the
Virgin's guardian back in the first century."

           
 
The memory of Carrie's girlish excitement over
that scroll punched a new ache through his chest.

           
 
Carrie,
Carrie . . . why couldn't you have just let them take her?

           
 
"Yours was a forgery, a copy of another,
but the words were true, as you discovered."

           
 
"Any idea who wrote it?" Dan said.

           
 
"I did."

           
 
Dan stared at him. "You must know your
first century, Mr. Kesev. That was a pretty convincing scroll. Where'd you
learn all that?"

           
 
Kesev shrugged. "From life."

           
 
"You mean from the guardians before you,
passing it down. Who are these guardians anyway? Members of some sect?"

           
 
"No. Only one guardian."

           
 
This conversation was getting strange.

           
 
"You mean just one at a time . . . one
guardian from each successive generation, right?"

           
 
Kesev shook his head. "No. Just one
guardian. Ever. From the beginning. Me."

           
 
"But that would make you a couple of
thousand . . ."

           
 
Kesev nodded slowly, but he wasn't smiling.

           
 
"No . . ." Dan said. "No, that
would be—"

           
 
"Impossible?"

           
 
Dan was about to say yes when it occurred to
him: Was anything impossible anymore?

           
 
And then he heard the rectory's side door
open. He stood up and started to cross the room.
Now
who was it?

           
Paraiso

           
 
"So this is what all the excitement is
about."

           
 
Arthur Crenshaw stared down at the mummified
body where it rested before him on the glass coffee table.

           
 
Paraiso was empty except for him and Charlie
and Emilio. Decker and Molinari had returned to their respective homes directly
from the airport. Arthur had sent all the help—domestic as well as nursing—home
for the night. The fewer who knew about his "borrowing" of the relic,
the better. Beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows of the great room lay the
unrelieved gloom of the night and the ocean. No starlight broke through the
restless mantle of cloud that stretched above the Pacific like a shroud. The
only sound in the great room was the swoosh of the wind against the glass and
Charlie's labored breathing.

           
 
He walked around the table, examining the body
from all sides. Not very impressive. Hardly lifelike at all. You could tell it
was somebody old and female, but that was about all. Could this be the actual
remains of the Virgin Mary? Didn't seem possible. All right, possible, yes, but
highly improbable. You'd think there'd be some sort of glow or aura about it if
it was really Mary. So maybe it was just the nicely preserved remains of an
early saint.

           
 
Whatever it was, could it save Charlie?

           
 
Arthur sighed. Apparently it had healed
others—many others—back in
New York
. No reason why it shouldn't do the same here.

           
 
But whatever it did, it had better do it
quickly. Charlie was fading away before his eyes. The latest try at a new
experimental therapy had failed. Charlie's CD-4 count was lower than ever. He
didn't have much time. This relic was his last chance at a cure.

           
 
But how to go about it?

           
 
Charlie was running one of his fevers again,
semicomatose most of the time, and when he was responsive he was delirious—no
idea of who he was or where he was or even that he was sick. He couldn't pray
to this object, couldn't ask it or anyone else for help.

           
 
So that left it up to Arthur to do the
praying.

           
 
Maybe Charlie and the object should be closer.
And since it was such a major task to move Charlie's setup with its IVs and
oxygen tank, Arthur figured the easiest way to get the two together was to move
the body.

           
 
If
Mohammed can't come to the mountain . . .

           
 
He turned to Emilio. "Let's move her over
by Charlie, table and all."

           
 
Emilio held back a moment. He'd seemed to be
keeping his distance from the body. Strange . . . Arthur had always thought of
Emilio as the least superstitious man he'd ever met. When he finally
approached, they each took an end of the coffee table and, carrying it like a
stretcher, moved the table and its burden around the couch and set it down next
to Charlie's hospital bed.

           
 
Arthur then said a prayer, asking the Lord to
forgive Charlie for his past and to allow the healing powers in this relic—be
it the remains of His earthly Mother or some other holy person—to drive the
infection from his son's wasted body so that he might continue his life and
have an opportunity to make up for the evil ways of his past.

           
 
As he finished the prayer with a heartfelt
recital of the "Our Father," Arthur slipped Charlie's painfully thin,
limp, clammy arm through the guardrail and guided it toward the body on the
table. He pressed the back of Charlie's hand against its dry cheek and held it
there.

           
 
Arthur wasn't sure what he'd expected, but he
was hoping for more than what he got, which was nothing.

           
 
He swallowed his disappointment. He had to
keep in mind that there'd been no pyrotechnics associated with the
Manhattan
healings, so the lack of them here didn't
mean that nothing had happened.

           
 
He held Charlie's hand against the skin for a
good fifteen minutes, all the while praying for mercy for his son, then he
replaced the arm under the bedsheet.

           
 
He noticed Emilio standing off to the side,
staring out at the darkness. He seemed preoccupied.

           
 
"Well," Arthur said, "all we
can do now is watch and wait."

           
 
Emilio nodded but said nothing.

           
 
Arthur shrugged and turned on the TV to check
out the latest on the big Pacific storm. The Weather Channel said it was still
headed for the southern part of the state. Paraiso would get only the fringe
winds.

           
 
Good. In the morning he'd have some blood
drawn on Charlie for a stat CD-4 count. If this relic had done its work, the
count would be up and Charlie's fever would break.

           
 
Please,
God. Not for me . . . for Charlie.

           
 
He switched to CNN in the middle of a story
about the theft of a religious object from a
Manhattan
church. Film showed close-ups of enraged
faces and crowds tipping over police cars and smashing store windows.

           
 
Arthur's stomach lurched and he glanced back
at the body on the table next to Charlie's bed. That was the only object they
could be talking about. But why such coverage—on CNN of all places? He hadn't
expected this kind of commotion. He'd have to have Emilio drop it off someplace
where it could be "discovered" tomorrow.

           
 
And then the screen showed the newswoman at a
desk with the face of a young nun superimposed over her shoulder. Arthur leaned
forward, straining his ears because what she was saying could not be true. The
young nun had been murdered during the theft of the object.

           
Murdered!

           
 
Arthur swiveled in his seat and tried to rise
to his feet but his legs wouldn't support him.

           
 
"Emilio?" he gasped. "You
didn't . . . you couldn't have . . ."

           
 
But the look in Emilio's eyes told him more
than any words could say.

           
 
"Dear God, Emilio! Dear
God!"

           
Manhattan

           
 
As Dan watched, a pale, dark-haired woman in a
long white coat stepped inside the rectory side door.

           
 
Dan dropped his drink. His knees buckled and
he clutched the back of a chair to keep from falling. He opened his mouth to
speak but his voice wasn't there.

           
Carrie!

           
 
"I have to go to
California
, Dan," she said evenly as she entered
the front room.