The Firstborn (9 page)

The river was ahead.

John surged, rushing through trees to—

A steep embankment yawned wide out in front of him, and he grabbed hold of a tangle of vines, his weight teetering out over the precipice. He held on, looking down. Far to his right, slipping down the river he saw—no, felt, the boy—his thoughts screaming in horror.

Throwing himself back he snatched a handful of branches, dragging himself back into the forest.

Parallel,
he thought as he tore a swath through the jungle, he had to run parallel to the river if he was ever going to get ahead of the boy. That was his only hope—to get ahead of the boy.

It was impossible, every bit of sense he had knew it was impossible, he couldn’t outrun the river’s current through the tangle of the trees—but there was something else, another voice, the same voice that had shown him where Paolo was. It goaded him on.

John surged.

Paolo felt his body plunge beneath the surface again, trying to hold his breath, air escaping from his lungs like frightened birds from a tree, spilling out in a billowing froth. He fought to the surface again, sucking air into his burning lungs, hands trying to force himself upward—but there was only water.

The river consumed him.

Then his body hit something hard.

John ran.

His attention was divided between the world ahead of him—rippling with green—and the river beside him where the boy bobbed. He couldn’t see him or feel him anymore. John stopped at the steep embankment and looked out. The boy wasn’t downriver.

Maybe Paolo had hit a fast current.

Maybe he was too far down the river to catch.

Maybe he’d already drowned.

Then he heard shouting. His head snapped to the left—he saw something. Paolo had hit a rock, a big one, and was holding on for dear life.

The boy was slipping fast. He couldn’t see it, but he could feel it in his own hands, the jagged edges of the sharp rock slicing in. Paolo wasn’t going to be able to hold on long.

But it was a delay—that was what John needed.

Somewhere in the back of his head he thanked God and continued his crash forward.

Then he felt it—Paolo couldn’t hold on any longer. The boy slipped. Ahead the river forked, one branch cutting a hard right, the other branch cutting equally hard to the left. If the boy was pulled to the right, he’d be able to cut the corner and grab him. If he was pulled left, he’d be pulled off and away—lost forever.

John had faith. Not in his own ability. It was beyond that now. He couldn’t control which way the boy slipped. What he had was the faith that the river would pull him to the right—that the God of the universe, who had created everything in six days, could catch one seven-year-old boy in the right current to carry him to the right.

It was blind faith, he knew that, but it was his.

Ahead of him he saw the river turn perpendicular to his path. There was another embankment, not as steep, but slick with mud and runoff. He threw himself over the edge, legs first, careening down the mudslide. Roots punched at his sides and rocks clawed at his arms. His heels tried to dig in, but his boots didn’t catch, his clothes soaking up mud like a sponge.

He caught a root with a battered hand.

Holding on, he took stock of his surroundings. The ground beneath his feet gave way, sinking into the river. His boot skipped over the surface of the rushing torrent.

He cursed out loud at the top of his lungs, hoping Paolo couldn’t somehow hear.

Where was Paolo? He should have been able to see the boy by now—if the river had pulled him to the right.

All around the embankment was giving way. This had been a very bad idea. He should have taken a closer look before he’d jumped over the edge.

To his right he saw a fallen tree that had been dislodged by the disintegrating embankment, its trunk stretching out over the water. Good, he thought.

To his left there was still no Paolo. Bad, he reassessed.

He worked his way to the fallen tree, boots sinking into the mud as he walked laterally across the hazardous slope. A moment later he was there. He looked back—

Still no Paolo.

John positioned himself so he could reach down and grab the boy. His legs gripped the wet trunk. He looked up—

There was nothing in the river except for loose chunks of debris. He prayed, heart searching for answers. Why didn’t he see the boy? God wouldn’t allow that—wouldn’t permit it. Or maybe, John thought, he was mistaken.

Then he saw something.

Bobbing and dark, the size of a boy, it drew closer and closer—

A chunk of loose bark. Debris.

His heart sank. This was unbelievable. Unacceptable. He sat upright, putting a hand to his forehead. How could this happen?

He looked upriver—and saw Paolo.

Reaching out, he caught the boy by the back of the shirt and pulled him up, changing his grip to haul the child out of the water. A moment later Paolo was out of the water, but he wasn’t moving.

“Oh no,” John said to himself.

John found a flat place on the embankment and laid the boy out, checking his pulse.

Weak.

He tipped the boy’s head back, cleared the airway, and placed his ear close to the boy’s nose and mouth.

He didn’t hear any air.

He didn’t feel any breath.

John fished in the boy’s mouth to see if anything was clogging the esophagus.

Clear.

He listened again.

Nothing.

Pinching Paolo’s nose, he held the boy’s chin and formed a solid, airtight seal over the boy’s mouth with his own. One puff of air, then a second. He listened again. No air.

Another two breaths. No air.

He tried again.

The boy was getting cold.

“Come on!” John growled, feeling like a character in a bad medical drama.

Moments passed, repetitions blurred together, one to another. Breaths—then listening, one after another.

Tears mixed with rainwater. Prayer mixed with profanity. The boy grew colder; his pulse grew weaker. Soon he’d have to begin chest compressions just to keep Paolo’s heart beating.

He gave another breath, then another, then stopped—he heard something. A hacking gurgle.

The boy’s body lurched, shoulders bucking, stomach churning, his mouth turning into a fountain as the first of it came up.

Water. Bile. The contents of his stomach.

He spewed them all up in a nauseating eruption of vomit that spilled over his cheeks and chest. John turned the boy on his side, letting it all drain out onto the mud, preventing him from choking on his own vomit.

The boy curled into a ball, moaning.

He was alive.

The rain had stopped.

Andy was standing on the front porch of the temp building when he saw John approaching with Paolo in his arms, the boy’s head resting on John’s shoulder. The missionary’s body sagged with obvious fatigue.

Andy approached. “Where did you run off to?”

“I was reading my Bible when it started to—”

“Why didn’t you tell anybody where you were going?” Andy demanded, trying not to let his anger show.

“I was only gone—”

“That’s not the point,” Andy interjected again, fists clenching in his pockets. “You could have gotten yourself killed, or Paolo for that matter.”

John nodded. “He fell in the river.”

“What?”

“We almost lost him.”

Andy felt livid rage bubble up inside him. “How did you find him?”

“That’s not important.”

“Why didn’t you come for help?”

“There wasn’t time,” he said, still walking. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’m taking this boy to his parents.”

What an arrogant punk, Andy thought. Always the rebel, always on the outside.

Andy prayed for forgiveness for the things he had just thought, then went back to the temp building, glad John would be leaving the next day.

Chapter 4

D
EVIN
B
ATHURST TURNED THE
key in the door and stepped into his penthouse apartment. The walls were red. He hadn’t chosen the colors, but it worked for him.

There were few pictures, mostly those that had been given to him as gifts. The majority were landscapes or foreign architecture.

Out the window he could see down into the Manhattan skyline, millions of tiny lights shining like stars across the landscape.

He sighed and approached the stereo, picking up the remote control. He keyed the command to start the CD player, and a long, melancholy trumpet note lifted warmly from the speakers. The dissonant notes of a jazz piano joined, and the jagged rhythms of the drums filled out the ensemble.

He liked jazz—it was calming, sophisticated, and not overly decorative in its sounds. It was good for filling the silence that otherwise hung from the walls in long, tedious stretches.

Devin loosened his tie, moved to the phone, and pressed the button on the answering machine.

“You have no new messages,” a cold, mechanical voice announced. He nodded to himself and moved to the refrigerator. Frozen leftovers sat stacked in Tupperware containers, like bricks in a fortress wall. Masking tape with black marker scrawled along their sides announced what each container held:

Meatloaf. Mushroom stroganoff. Spaghetti. Lasagna. All frozen and cold, prepared by a woman named Bonnie who came and cleaned for him twice a week, making him meals while she was at it.

He reached in and removed the first container on the top right—just like always. Working his way across and down kept the refrigerator organized. He looked at the container to see what tonight’s selection was.

Swedish meatballs. He opened the container and put it in the microwave, setting the cooking time for exactly five minutes and thirty-five seconds—precisely the amount of time needed, a fact he had deduced from exact experimentation for each of the seven meals that Bonnie knew how to cook.

He stood, waiting for the microwave to finish its work, listening casually to the somber tones of the music from the next room. His fingers felt like tapping on the counter, but he refrained.

Living alone was easy. Didn’t have to cook or clean. More income could be freed up for personal interests, and you didn’t have to worry about someone nagging you about how your day had been.