Beverly must suspect more than he originally thought. If Nate was so quick to see the guilt in his father’s eyes, surely Bev saw much more. One night. One stupid drunken night, and everything changed. What had he been thinking? He loved his wife, loved his family and God. But if that was true, why feel such a strong desire to keep away from the church? If anything, he should be falling to his knees and begging for forgiveness, from both the Lord and Beverly; two absolutions which would quickly pull him from the confusing spiral in which he found himself these last few months. Instead, he returned to the men’s club, night after night, pulled there like an addiction.
Waiting for the woman to return, perhaps? the voice asked.
“No,” he whispered through his hands, and hoped no one heard. Too much to drink that night, that was all. For him, who normally had no more than an occasional beer or glass of wine, he must have passed whatever limit his body could handle that night, so much that later events blurred in his memory. The odd thing was he didn’t remember having more than one beer. Still, if it wasn’t for Manny Paulson filling in the blanks as he drove him home that night, Art likely wouldn’t have remembered any of it. Maybe that would have been better. Ignorance is bliss, as the saying went.
Art leaned back in his chair, absently tapped the space bar on his keyboard to keep the screen saver from kicking in. Even now, he had trouble visualizing details about the woman. She had frizzy red hair, he was sure of that. White blouse, big smile. He remembered talking to her after she’d entered the club, something about a car broken down, stranding her for the moment. She decided to stay, “and party.” Those two words were clear. The club hadn’t been crowded that night—Paulson, Quinn, and a couple of others who’d already begun to drink themselves into a quagmire and became lost in their usual poker game. Art did recall that first beer, at least. He wondered, not for the first time, if something had been added to the drink. That implied someone there had done it, and...
...everyone in the Hillcrest Men’s Club can be trusted, the voice in his head said. It is safe there.
No, it couldn’t have been anyone there. Why would they lie about that? After all, he’d come to his senses in the back room, the woman lying beside him with a contented smile. The memory sent a pained revulsion through him.
He leaned forward to pray for forgiveness, for clarity in thought. And, like the other times he’d tried this, he felt only a hesitancy, an unwillingness to give this burden over to God. An invisible hand seemed to fall over him. He grew angry...
...weak man, can’t depend on his own strength....
He cursed his weakness. Was this the man he’d turned out to be? So what? He was drunk that night. Nothing wrong with that. If something happened with the woman, he wasn’t to blame. He couldn’t even remember it except in quick flashes, as if he’d been watching rather than participating. He loved his wife, and would not feel guilty the rest of his life over one mistake.
...if the church tries to make you feel guilty, you should forget all about it....
He looked at his computer screen, focusing through the reflected overhead lights on the program he’d been working on. In the reflection, he could make out the edges of the cubicles behind him. A man with short white hair stood there, watching him.
Art spun in his chair. No one was standing in the aisle outside his cubicle.
There never had been, of course. The building was secure enough in that regard. Peter Quinn would not have been allowed in without an escort. He was seeing things again. The need to go to the club tonight—just for a little while, for crying out loud—came over him like a junkie’s need for a fix.
Not that Art thought of it that way. To him, it was a perfectly natural desire for a man to have.
Part Two: Departure
Constantinople, 1204 A.D.
Everard of Dampierre had only a few minutes in the cavernous room to consider the proper direction to move. Already the remaining crusaders, all of whom were well-acquainted with this “secret” basilica under the Church of the Apostles, were regrouping above. Everard could divert them only temporarily, giving their troop leaders directions with his sacred Voice. Scattered among the city and other corners of the cathedral, they would not immediately stumble upon the passage which would lead them here. The knights of the Crusade, dedicated and loyal to their leaders for the past two years, could maintain ranks only so long. For most, the promise of riches beyond their feeble imaginations was the primary incentive for leaving their families in the first place. So close to such wealth and treasures, they would soon be uncontrollable in their lust. Nothing was sacred. Everything profane.
It was a wonderful day.
The six men under his command were carefully chosen over the past year as their troops, from ships off the Byzantine coast, angrily watched this city’s bloody politics unfold. Their financier, the newly reinstated emperor Alexius IV, and his son—who had successfully rerouted Pope Innocent’s troops to Constantinople in the first place—managed to get themselves decapitated only a few short months after regaining power. For Everard, the turn of events proved advantageous. Father and son had outlived their usefulness. Rumors of wealth below both this church and Hagia Sophia drew him into the city and surrounding islands. His ability to control others allowed earlier visits to this fabled, cross-shaped room to be possible.
His men now stared in wonder about the basilica. The riches in this place were beyond counting. Everard spoke to each man individually, telling them all of this belonged to them provided they did what he asked of them right now. In truth, mobs of their fellow knights would be here soon, but they did not need to know that.
They followed the knight to a spot beyond the Column of Flagellation. Thankfully, none of the others knew its significance. Enough distractions were about to make the task of controlling them difficult, as it was.
“Sire,” called a squire named Marcus, no older than sixteen. He held up a broken sandal. “I found this on the floor. Over there.” He pointed to a section of wall just beyond the Column. To the others, the discovery meant nothing. To Everard, it meant someone had beaten them down here!
“Quickly!” He felt along the wall, as he had done the last time he’d visited this room. Now, however, he knew what he was looking for. Had, in fact, entered the next chamber only one week earlier. Everard had stood before the very Ark of the Covenant and wept with joy, an uncharacteristic display of emotion but one which he allowed himself just that one time. But he had dared go no further. Haste killed. Everard had returned to his ship to begin the too-easy task of influencing the Crusaders to at last take matters into their own hands. Alexius V, the anti-Rome replacement to the headless former emperor, was refusing any trade negotiations with Rome. Things then moved along of their own accord. The men were eager for battle, among other more immoral pleasures available in such a vast city. The invasion of Constantinople by the forces of the Fourth Crusade was the culmination of Everard of Dampierre’s master plan. And of the great god Molech, known by many names over the centuries: Bringer of Chaos and Death, Loki, Lucifer.
Now, finally, the prize his master had sought since the days of Solomon’s fall would be his. No flea-ridden priest or knight or whoever was inside would stop him. Everard had stood beyond this stone passage, seen with his own eyes, heard with his very soul the power of such a relic. He understood more clearly now than perhaps thousands before him why the master sought it so. Never mind the mindless other rumors or theories held by the Elders and so many of his predecessors. To him, it was simply... perfect.
“Prepare to storm inside as soon as the door is open.” The men drew their swords, expecting a siege of defenders beyond. Everard removed a studded glove from his left hand and inserted fingers into three holes that were angled to make them invisible to the casual observer. He pulled. His hand was damp with sweat. His fingers slipped free and the door crashed closed. He cursed, wiped his hands on his leather wrist shield and tried again. This time he kept his body leaning hard
into the gesture. The door opened.
“You,” he indicated the squire, focusing his voice since the lad was beginning to consider their surroundings a bit too hungrily. “Stand here and hold this door open. If anyone other than us comes along, in either direction, cut them down.”
“Sire!” The boy named Marcus leaned against the door. Everard led his men down the long hall, turned the corner. He stopped, knowing what he would see. The others continued past him but soon they, too, froze in their tracks at the realization of what stood before them.
“My God,” one of the men said, and fell to his knees.
Everard shouted, “You shall not utter that name here! Do as I say and the world shall be yours to command!” There was enough controlled cadence in his voice to get their attention. Time was running out. There was no one here. Another, narrower passage opened on their right. It had not been there the last time.
He gestured to two soldiers armed with long, crooked staffs. They believed they were carrying lances. The staffs were actually well-trimmed branches of acacia wood.
Then Everard realized two things simultaneously. The first was that the Ark’s lid was partially open. Someone had defiled it! His blood boiled; his face burned in rage. A moment later, all color drained from the expression.
A fat man—a bishop if his attire was any indication—appeared in the entrance to the side passage. Something was clutched against his chest, glowing softly in the darkness. With his free hand, the bishop gripped a wooden lever beside the doorway.
Something in the fat man’s eyes told the knight he had to run now! Before he could do anything, the bishop pulled down on the lever. The room filled with the sound of grinding stone. The holy man was gone as quickly as he’d appeared. Everard of Dampierre wondered for half a second if the man had escaped down a trap door; then the ceiling crushed down upon him and his men in a deluge of boulders and stone.
When the remaining horde of crusaders charged into the cross-shaped basilica of the Apostles, they found a young squire digging at a mound of rubble filling a doorway. Two of the newcomers eagerly joined him, assuming riches lay beyond. They soon lost interest for easier pickings among the sarcophagi. A moment later, even the squire Marcus stopped digging. He joined the others in search of spoils.
Chapter Seventeen
Nathan gently brushed a gray strand of hair away from Margaret Conan’s forehead. When he finished speaking a prayer to comfort her in her pain, she opened her eyes and smiled. The gesture dropped a decade from her sunken, wrinkled face.
“Thank you, Pastor, and may the Lord bless you and your work as well.”
Nathan sat back in his position at the edge of the bed, careful not to brush against her thin legs under the sheet. As advanced as Mrs. Conan’s diabetes had become, she never complained, but he knew enough about the symptoms to be cautious. As always, she was overjoyed to share prayer and scripture, even asked about his parents. Margaret Conan had once been his neighbor, three doors down from the Dinneck home. She would babysit him as a toddler, and in later years, he’d visit for no other reason than simply to share her company. Her house had the air of freshly baked cookies and spice candies.
Reverend Hayden suggested he visit the nursing home alone, having to make a trip himself to the monastery to make final arrangements for his arrival. On the drive across town, Nathan worried about being too distracted— about running into Elizabeth. Seeing her was inevitable, though. If not today, some day soon. There would be no avoiding it. Whether she would want to speak with him, after such a long time without any communication save secondhand reports from Josh Everson, was another question.
He closed the old woman’s Bible and unconsciously ran his hand across its familiar, threadbare cover. When she had asked him to choose the reading earlier, Nathan picked the opening chapters of Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians. His parents had often read scriptures aloud to him when he was younger, so they never complained when Mrs. Conan did the same when he was in her care. Nathan remembered many afternoons in her living room, eating oatmeal raisin cookies while she occasionally read short passages for the sheer joy of sharing in the Word with such an eager audience of one. When Nathan was old enough to stay home alone while his mother was out, he would still wander up the road now and then to visit. She always seemed pleased to see him, to discuss and debate passages from the same Bible Nathan now held in his hand—less worn and frayed back then, but not by much.
If he was ever asked when his calling to the ministry first occurred, Nathan could think of no stronger moments than those afternoons in Mrs. Conan’s living room, eating cookies.
He felt moved to explain this to her, but she suddenly looked past him toward the door, smiled wider and said, “Looks like you have a caller, Nate.”
Nathan turned, already knowing who was there.
Elizabeth O’Brien looked exactly as he remembered. There was a more determined set to her face, one that came with the level of maturity they both had reached over the past five years. The face still had the round, cherub-like quality which never failed to pull him to her. She wore jeans and sneakers, a blue pullover sweater and a pinned name tag that read “Elizabeth O.” She was tall, not quite his own height, but taller than the average woman, with the slightly-rounded figure of someone always fighting off extra pounds, winning some but never all of the battles. Her blonde hair was as thick and unruly as ever.
The smile on her face filled his heart with an unexpected happiness.
“Hi,” she said, and stuck her hands in her jeans’ pocket. All she would have to do, Nathan thought, would be to lean her shoulder casually against the door frame and she’d look—to use an expression Josh Everson was overly fond of using—way too cool.
“Hi,” he said, knowing it was the lamest response he could have given. Mrs. Conan’s thin hand nudged his arm. He looked back. She nodded in the direction of the door and said with a sly grin, “Bye, Nate.”
Chapter Eighteen
The coffee in the employee break room was surprisingly good. Nathan took another sip as Elizabeth returned from the vending machine with a can of ginger ale. She sat next to him at the small table, not in the seat opposite as he’d expected.
His head was spinning. He wished it would stop.
Nathan wondered if maybe his feelings for this woman were still as strong as ever. The thought brought a jolt of pain, not a physical hurt but a wrenching ache of the heart which revealed itself as a nervous rumble in his belly. He couldn’t love her. He was a minister and she was a self-proclaimed atheist. No, he never truly believed that last part, not with five years to replay that infamous conversation in his mind. She simply did not want to believe.
Don’t press, an inner voice said. It was sage advice, and the thought sobered him.
She said, “I thought Reverend Hayden wasn’t leaving until next week.”
Nathan raised an eyebrow. “You’re right. I think he’s making me try out my sea legs. How did you know when he was leaving?”
Elizabeth smiled. “Mrs. Conan keeps up on all the gossip. She shares it with me whether I want to hear it or not.”
It occurred to him that Mrs. Conan must have known about his episode Sunday. Since the first thing out of Elizabeth’s mouth wasn’t How are you feeling? his old neighbor probably hadn’t mentioned it. God bless that woman.
He asked, “Are you a nurse now?”
She nodded and looked down at her soda can. “I finally went back to school and finished up. Couldn’t let you have more degrees than me.”
Reflexively, Nathan said, “Yeah, but I’m ordained as well. Technically that means I’m one up on you diploma-wise.”
She laughed and said, “They give a diploma for that?”
“Well, they give us,” he made a box-like gesture with his two hands, “a thingy. You know, whatever they’re called.”
“Certificate?”
“Yeah, that’s it,” he said.
A short black woman, hair pulled tightly b
ack into a bun, poked her head and shoulders into the break room. “Lizzie, Mr. Gansky needs some... oh, hello,” she said, seeing Nathan.
Elizabeth, whose comfortable smile never wavered, swept her arm with a small flourish. “Serena, meet Nate. Oh, sorry, I mean Reverend Nathan.”
“Ooh, so this is the—”
“I’ll be right there,” Elizabeth interrupted, her composure at last broken. Her neck flushed red. “Sorry, Nate. Got to see what Mr. G. wants.”
They stood at the same time. “That’s OK.” He hesitated, and hoped Serena, as nice as she seemed to be, was no longer there. “Seeing you again was, um, really great.”
Elizabeth began to speak, caught herself, then sighed. She stepped forward, hesitantly; then the two embraced in a gentle, quiet hug.
So much time had passed since he’d held her like this. The sensation of her in his arms felt strange. No, he realized, not strange. It felt new. They were two different people, now.
In that moment, he was certain of one thing. He did still have feelings for her. Strong feelings. If he had his doubts before, now they were no more.
Another dilemma to deal with in the little town of Hillcrest.
They reluctantly parted from the embrace, and Elizabeth was again flustered.
She put her open soda into the refrigerator and dumped his half-finished cup of coffee in the sink. “Maybe we can get together some place where we can talk more than just a few minutes,” she said.
“I’d like that.” His heart was racing. He needed air. This wasn’t a good idea.
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