Текст книги "Illusion"

Автор книги: Фрэнк Перетти

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Текущая страница: 33 (всего у книги 33 страниц)

chapter

53

Rancher Jack Wright never heard from or saw the weird scientists again, which was fine with him; it was part of the deal. As for the 35.76 concrete blocks, they also were part of the deal. He hauled them away to use in a new pigsty, leaving that isolated little piece of his ranch looking as if no one had ever been there—if anyone even cared to look.

On Saturday evening at about seven, Dane stepped through the back door into his kitchen. The place was quiet.

“Hello?” he called, but there was no answer.

He walked through the house, checking the living room, the downstairs guest room and bath, the rooms upstairs. He stopped by his closet where Mandy’s costumes and wardrobe still hung neatly, touching the sleeve of the blue gown. Passing by his dresser, he studied a recent photo portrait; she was still so lovely.

He checked his answering machine. No messages. Well, that was part of the plan, cell and land phone silence until they knew which way the winds were blowing, whether the bad guys were listening.

He drove to the Quik Stop on Highway 95 to use the pay phone. Somewhere in Las Vegas, in a hotel room, a rented office, perhaps the home of one of Arnie’s friends, a telephone rang, but no one answered. He rechecked the number Arnie gave him and dialed again. Still no answer. He returned the receiver to the cradle less than gently, then sighed, resigning himself to a little more waiting, a little more not knowing.

He returned to the ranch, carried in his luggage, and then brought in Mandy’s four doves in their cage. They were tired, ready to sleep, so he set them in the utility room with the light off so they could call it a night.

Shirley had left all his mail in a pile on the kitchen counter and a note catching him up on the spraying she’d done, getting a new drive belt for the lawn mower, replacing the bulbs in the shop with the brighter wattage he wanted, having Susan the housekeeper skip a week and … blah blah blah, thank you, Shirley, he was too tired, too edgy to read the rest.

He fixed himself a bowl of oat flakes, something quick and easy, and settled in front of his computer to see if he could get any news.

The EPA had taken immediate interest in the “hazardous waste spill” in that vacant lot. A remediation crew showed up within an hour, cordoned off the area, and worked through the night to sanitize it, replacing six inches of topsoil and hydroseeding grass. The agency also took over the subbasement of the hospital, declaring those floors an environmental hazard and sealing them off. Dane had to wonder why a hospital was allowed to remain open sitting on top of an environmental hazard, but of course there was no explanation.

Public outcry prevented any killing of the doves, so they were being captured to be sold on the Internet, distributed to pet stores, employed by local magicians, adopted by bird lovers from all over the country. White doves were free for the catching and selling dirt cheap in Las Vegas.

As for deaths, casualties, missing persons, even what became of Mandy Whitacre, the newspeople had nothing, and the government was strangely, silently uninvolved.

Dane sighed and let his head drop. He didn’t know, would probably never know, what Parmenter’s “contingency plan” was, but if Dane threw Mandy’s collective mass off, there would have been only one way to counterbalance it. He probably would never see the venerable scientist again.

The Orpheus Hotel Casino had already booked another act for the big room in the aftermath of the great and mysterious tragedy: Gabriel’s Magic, featuring the famous television magician Preston Gabriel, who just happened to have some time available. Well, that worked. The Orpheus got a spike in name recognition no amount of money could buy and a great show besides. Now Dane didn’t feel quiteso bad.

He closed the computer and rubbed his eyes, so very tired. To stay out of airports where he might be seen or looked for, he’d driven Preston’s Wrangler from Vegas to Salt Lake City, where he slept in a cheap room, then drove all day Saturday to get home … to an empty house, and no word.

He tried to sleep that night and finally dropped off. The telephone let him sleep; it never made a sound.

Sunday morning the weather was cheerful, a rare occurrence for March in Idaho. It helped. There wasn’t a swelling bud or a new blade of grass in sight, but it helped. Dane checked the answering machine again—it was a little irrational, but he might have missed something. No messages.

All right. He’d take another trip down to the Quik Stop and try the number again. He grabbed his coat from the closet—

A cooing from the utility room stopped him. Oh, brother. Can’t it wait?

Well …

If all things were ordinary, he would have left them there until he got back, but these were not just four little doves among many, these were Bonkers, Carson, Lily, and Maybelle. They were stars, ultimate aviators, and most of all, heroes. He saw them fly with Mandy through the whole thing and it tugged at his heart like crazy. However things turned out, he owed them.

And, of course, there was Mandy. She’d want them well taken care of.

He brought them into the kitchen and they were glad to see him, sidestepping back and forth on their perches, chirping, bobbing around. He gave them some breakfast—fresh seeds, water, celery tops from the refrigerator—and leaned on his elbows watching them scarf it all down. “I wonder if you guys even have a clue what you did.”

They just kept eating, cooing, and chirping.

He shrugged. All in a day’s work. Another day, another seed, another leaf of celery.

They needed to get out of this cage. It seemed to Dane like living in a hotel room, out of a suitcase. They needed to be home in their coop, where they had plenty of room to move and fly around. “Okay, guys, let’s go.”

The dove coop was a temporary and adequate installation inside the shop building, just the right home for the doves until spring warmed things up and they could spend more time outside. The shop building was just a short walk down the path toward Mandy’s Meadow.

The morning sun made it a pleasant walk—warm colors, warmth on Dane’s south shoulder, the snow all gone, and a little steam coming off the barn roof. Some crocuses were coming up. The doves were fluttering, looking all around, excited.

He opened the door to the shop and went inside.

“Wow! You remember this place, don’t you?” They were really hopping and chirping, more agitated than he expected. They must really be glad to be home.

The cage door flipped open.

“ What?Hey, whoa, whoa, don’t—!”

They crowded through it, jostling, bumping, climbing over each other.

In all his effort to keep them in their cage he didn’t notice he’d left the shop door open.

“No! No no no no no!”

If it had been a movie with somebody else climbing the walls and grabbing the air trying to catch four ultimate aviators, Dane would have gotten the biggest laugh out of it, but it wasn’t and he wasn’t. He could have sworn they were working as a team, faking him out until they all got out the door.

The door. Why didn’t I just close the door?

Stupid. No, preoccupied. I’ve been through a lot.

No, stupid.

He stepped through the door and, for the sake of his own dignity and self-worth, closed it after him. The doves were up by the house aviating, making wild circles and loops over the driveway, showing off, having the time of their lives. “Yeah, rub it in.”

The phone rang in the kitchen.

“Oohhh!”When it rained, it poured. Loose doves andthe phone ringing. If Dane had been sitting on the toilet right now the morning would have been perfect.

He ran up the pathway, all stops out, pedal to the metal, his legs still sore from the last big run, and got to the kitchen door as the answering machine picked up. “Hi, this is Dane. Please leave a short message …”

Who? Who is it?

The doves were soaring high, heading down the driveway, as good as gone.

He almost went inside to hear the message but stopped on the threshold.

“Hi, this is Jack Lewis …” Arnie’s code name! “Just want you to know that your order is still in process”—they hadn’t found Mandy yet—“but be advised the, uh, the means of shipping is, uh, unavailable … well, it’s gone, we can’t find it.” They couldn’t locate her blue Volkswagen. “However, if you have any information you can get back to us at …”

Arnie was leaving a new number to call, but Dane was watching the doves circle down toward the front gate, then perch, hop, and fly in short bursts along the top of the paddock fence, following …

A blue Volkswagen, rolling, jostling, whirring up the driveway. Arnie hung up, and Dane didn’t care. He stepped into the driveway, wanting only to see who was behind the wheel. When the little car came near the house and into the winter-thin shade of the aspens, he could see through the windshield.

It was …

What world was he living in now? Had he fallen from the real world into another madness, or from one madness, one dream, into another? Could he really believe what he was seeing, or was another reality or illusion or goofy deflection in the space-time watchamacallit going to horn in and change everything again? He wanted to believe, but he couldn’t. He thought he’d be ready and could handle it, but all he could do was stand there.

When she’d stopped the Bug, set the brake, and turned off the engine, she looked at him through the car window for the longest time, as if she were having the very same questions, as if that pane of glass could shield her from answers she couldn’t bear.

She was glad he remained so still, so everyday human with his bruises, tousled morning hair, and confounded expression. She needed a good, reassuring look at him before she opened the car door—and maybe he needed that kind of look at her.

He looked like the man she remembered, as real as ever he’d been. Shelooked like …

She stole a look at herself in the rearview mirror.

Do you remember, my love? All the years, all the seasons, all the changes we went through? These are what brought us to this day, this is who we really are, and this is where we belong. Do you see it that way?

Dane approached as the doves lit on the car roof, their feet tap-tap-tapping on the metal. He gazed at her through the window, put his fingertips on the glass. She placed her fingertips against his from the other side. They had the time, so they took it to look at each other.

She was alive. Beautiful and unafraid.

He placed his hand on the door handle. The latch clicked. He eased the door open, she swung her feet out, and then she stood with no glass, no door, no barrier between them.

She’d made it to Idaho.

“Well …” he said, drinking in the sight of her. This was she, the woman he’d loved for forty years.

Six-oh, she thought. Of course.He was supposed to be sixty and now it didn’t seem one bit strange to her. She was feeling kind of sixtyish herself and it wasn’t so bad, just a month or two older than she was before. It fit.

“Well …” she said back with a little smile, but thought, Go ahead, touch me.

* * *

He extended his hand. Maybe she’d touch him and see he was real, or he’d touch her …

She took his hand in hers and covered it with her other hand.

She was real, as real as ever she’d been.

They embraced, and from there they got to know each other again, taking it slow, feeling it new, savoring the hours as on their very first night.

chapter

54

Her soul at peace, Mandy slept until midday, then rose, showered, and slipped into Dane’s blue robe. It was warm and comfortable, and there was just something commemorative about it: she’d worn it right after he rescued her the first time. The thrill of it was, she didn’t have wet clothes in the dryer and, just as on their first day married, she would never have to leave.

Dane must have heard her stirring about. As she emerged from the bedroom he came up the stairs carrying a latte for himself and a mocha for her, brewed in their same old trusty coffeemaker.

“Oh, thank you, kind sir.”

“But of course.”

He’d pulled on his jeans and a pair of slippers. She took a second look at him, something she’d been doing since she got here.

“What?” he asked.

“You are so hairy!”

“Why, thank you.”

“When we first got married you had maybe two hairs on your chest.”

He shrugged and sipped from his latte. “Have you seen my ears lately?”

He settled into a chair in the loft. There was a sweeping view of the valley behind him, but he wouldn’t stop looking at her.

She went to the east windows, admiring the view, recalling raking and sweeping out the barn, cleaning out the shop, all the work on this place … and all the snow, Lord have mercy!She certainly had the energy back then.

“So,” she ventured, “what are we going to do? I mean, how do we tell the world I’m alive again?”

He put on a very typical deep-in-thought expression. “Well, we could borrow from Mark Twain and say the reports of your death were greatly exaggerated.”

She smiled, enjoying the smell of the mocha beneath her nose. “I suppose.”

He smiled back and sipped from his coffee. “I’m making a list.”

“I still have a coat I borrowed from a nurse in the Behavioral Health Unit. We need to put that on the list, get that back to her.”

“That’ll be the easy part.”

Okay. She felt better. “Oh, and I’ve been meaning to say”—he waited, clearly enjoying the sight of her—“it sure means a lot to me that you didn’t fall for a younger woman.”

She could see the twinkle in his eye before he said it. “And go through menopause all over again?”

She could have given him a slick comeback, but something caught her eye …

A girl running through the pasture toward the house, staggering, falling, getting up again, reaching desperately.

“What is it?” he asked, but then he froze at the sight of her just as she remained transfixed by the sight out the window. “Ohhh, man. Déjà vu. You see her, don’t you?”

It was … well, of course. It was the girl who’d been looking inthe mirror, the child who so desperately wanted to be her. “Oh, keep running, little one. Keep running.”

Dane stood beside her, put his arm around her. “Don’t you worry. She’s going to be just fine.”

The image in the pasture dissolved like a wisp of steam, and then it was just the two of them.

a note from the author

Of course I’ve been asked, “What’s the book about?” and it’s never been quite enough to answer, “A love story about two illusionists who are separated by death but not really, not yet, and their quest to find each other and be reunited.” That’s a nice encapsulation, but it doesn’t express the heart of the story.

A better answer would be found in the symbolism and thematic elements:

• Being lost in this weird and sinful world, trying to discover who we are and where we belong;

• The deception and lure of this world that we overcome as we reach for heaven, our home;

• The comforting presence of the Holy Spirit and His quiet assurances that we have a place in this world as well as a holy and eternal destination;

• Our longing and lifelong quest as the bride of Christ to be united with Jesus, our bridegroom.

And I need to add a personal, heart-level reflection: For me, the story is about Barb, my dear wife and best friend for forty years, and the mystery, tenacity, beauty, and wonder of our love from the day we met until now. Building the story and developing its themes were a matter of mind and creativity, but it was our love that drove it, that gave it life. Thinking about Dane and Mandy, I thought about us, and not only that, I also found a new appreciation for what our marriage symbolizes. After all, what is the Gospel if not the story of our savior wooing us to Himself and that relentless, unutterable longing that makes us reach across our years and through our limitations to find Him? For me, that’s the heartof it. That’s where I live.

So I suppose this tale is a fictional tribute to love as God made it, and by that, an illustration of how beautiful the love between ourselves and our Lord can be. It’s a story worth telling, always. Thank you for sharing it with me.

Blessings.

Frank E. Peretti

acknowledgments

Every time I do a novel, there are friends around to help me with the details. It’s fun to see such learned and professional people dive headlong into making up and telling a story, and I always get an education in the process.

Special thanks to …

Dr. Paul Brillhart, a wonderful brother in the Lord and an avid storyteller himself, who has enthusiastically helped me injure, kill, hospitalize, treat, and heal a host of characters in believable ways in two novels so far.

Teirza Bristow, a genuine emergency room nurse who talked me through every detail of ER procedure in a case like Mandy’s.

Dr. James Kirby, who gave me a fascinating telephone tour of a real behavioral health unit and provided an abundance of details on how a case like Mandy’s might be handled. Of course, the people and facility Mandy encounters in the story are fictionalized and have to be passive bad guys. Dr. Kirby, his staff, and their facility are a lot nicer!

The one and only Tony Brent, magician and comedian, who gave me so much of his valuable time to talk about the performance and business of magic. Keep an eye out for him, Google him, be sure to catch his show; he’ll keep you amazed and in stitches at the same time. All the best, my friend!

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Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

A Note from the Author

Acknowledgments

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

A Note from the Author

Acknowledgments