Everyone would be properly supportive at first, but he knew it wouldn't be long before the various elements of the coalition he'd been forging began edging away from him. All his Born-Again friends and admirers would begin looking around for someone else to support, someone who's immediate family was not so intimately associated with sodomy.
And then his dream of a renewed America would go down in flames, be reduced to ashes.
He treasured two things most in his life: his son and his dream. Charlie's AIDS was going to steal both.
He looked again at the Times and Daily News clippings in his lap. Like everyone else who read a paper or watched the network news, he'd heard about the four supposedly cured cases of AIDS in New York. They'd sparked some hope in the growing darkness within him, but after his experience with Olivia he'd learned that cynicism was the only appropriate response to miracle cures. It saved a lot of heartache.
But the Times article said the CDC was getting involved . . . budgeting an epidemiological study. If Arthur was correctly reading between the lines, it meant that these cures had been sufficiently verified for the CDC to judge them worth the effort and expense of sending an investigative team to Manhattan.
Interesting . . .
The CDC was headquartered in Atlanta. Arthur had myriad contacts in the Bible Belt. No problem learning what was going on in the CDC, but it might be wise to have his own man on the scene.
"Emilio," he said, "how would you feel about a trip to New York?"
Manhattan
Monsignor Vincenzo Riccio suppressed the urge to vomit as he walked along Catherine Street near the Governor Alfred E. Smith Houses and waited for dark. Dark would not be a safe time to be here, but he did not worry about that. He hadn't shaved for days and was dressed in the shabbiest clothes he'd been able to find at the Vatican Mission uptown. He was not an attractive mugging prospect. But even if he were killed tonight, it would not matter.
The new chemotherapy protocol was not working. It had succeeded only in suppressing his white cell count and making him violently ill. He'd lost more weight. The tumors continued their relentless spread. The end was not far off, so human predators could do nothing to him that the cancer and the chemicals had not already tried. A quick death here might be preferable to the slow death that threatened to linger into the fall, but surely not beyond.
But please, God, not before I see her again.
The Vatican had called today. Since he was already here in Manhattan, would he mind looking into these Blessed Virgin sightings that had become epidemic on the Lower East Side?
He'd agreed, of course. What he did not say was that he'd been investigating for weeks.
He'd read of the sightings and had been struck immediately by the similarity between the witnesses' descriptions of the faintly glowing woman they'd seen down here and the woman he'd seen walking on the fog over the River Lee back in July. He did not resist the yearning to search out this Stateside apparition to see if she was the same.
So far his quest had been as successful as the new chemotherapy.
He scanned the streets around him. He spotted numerous Asian shoppers scurrying home through the fading light, each carrying their purchases in identical red plastic sacks. On his right sat rows of deserted, dilapidated, graffiti-scarred buildings, with empty windows in front and dark, litter-choked alleys on their flanks. All forlorn and forbidding.
She had been spotted twice near here. So like her son to appear down here among the social cast offs. If indeed it was her. Perhaps tonight she once more would grace this lowly neighborhood with her presence.
Israel
Kesev could feel the sweat trickle from his armpits as he clutched the ends of his armrests and stared out the window of El Al flight 001. He saw Tel Aviv and the coast of Israel fall away beneath him. Anyone watching him would think he was afraid of flying. He did not like it, true, but that was not what filled him with such anxiety.
Never before in his long life had he left his homeland. The very idea had been unthinkable until now. And even under these extraordinary circumstances, he was uneasy. He had never wanted to be more than a few hours away from the Resting Place. Now there would be a continent and an ocean between him and the site in the Wilderness where he had vowed to spend the rest of his days.
Not that it mattered now. The Mother was gone from the Resting Place. His duty was to follow her to wherever she now lay.
And Kesev had a pretty good idea now where that might be.
New York.
He couldn't be sure, of course. The visions of the Virgin Mary in Manhattan meant nothing by themselves. On any given day someone somewhere thought he or she had been gifted with a vision of the Mother of God, and this was nothing new for New York. Since the 1970s a woman named Veronica in a place called Bayside had claimed to see and speak to the Virgin on a regular basis. And more recently in Queens had been the painting of the Mother that had seeped oil.
Since the Mother's theft Kesev had accumulated a huge collection of reports on these visions. Lately the vast majority seemed to occur in America.
Some were utterly absurd—the image of the Blessed Virgin in the browned areas on a flour tortilla, in a patch of mold on the side of a refrigerator, in a forkful of spaghetti, on the side of a leaking fuel tank—and could be discarded without a second thought.
Others were more traditional apparitions, often repeated on a scheduled basis, such as the first Sunday or first Friday of the month, but although thousands would be in attendance for the occasion, the actual vision was restricted to a single individual. Kesev marked these as possible but most likely the product of one unbalanced mind and fed by the public's yearning for something, anything that might indicate a Divine Presence. Visions had been occurring long before the theft of the Mother and would certainly continue after she was returned to where she belonged.
But these Manhattan visions . . . something about them had sparked a flicker of hope in Kesev. They didn't follow the pattern of the other sightings. They appeared to be random, had been reported by a wide variety of people belonging to a polyglot of races and religions. When Muslims and Buddhists began reporting visions of a softly glowing woman in an ankle-length cowled robe, identical to the image Kesev had seen countless times atop the tav rock, he had to give them credence.
And then there was the matter of the cures.
The tabloid press was always touting cures for the incurable, but these cures were linked to no miracle drug or quack therapy. They were spontaneous and random, just like the sightings of the Virgin Mary.
And just like the sightings they all seemed to be clustered in the Lower East Side of Manhattan.
He glanced at his watch. The flight was due to arrive in Kennedy at 5:20 A.M. local time. Shortly after that, Kesev, too, would be in Lower Manhattan.
Searching.
If the Mother was there, Kesev would find her. He had to find her. And when he did he would silence the thieves so they could not reveal what they knew. Then he would return the Mother to the Resting Place where she belonged, where she would remain until the Final Days.
Only two questions bothered Kesev. Who were these people who had stolen the Mother away from him? The job was so smoothly and skillfully done, leaving not a trace of a trail, they had to be professionals. If that were so, why was no one trumpeting her discovery? He was overjoyed that there had been no such announcement, for that meant he could still set matters right before irreparable damage was done. But why the silence? Could it be they didn't know what they had? Or were they, perhaps, trying to verify what they had? Whatever the reason, he could not let this opportunity pass.
The second question was more unsettling. Why had the Lord allowed this to happen? Did it mean that the Final Days were imminent? That the End of All Things was at hand?
Part of Kesev hoped so, for he was desperately tired of living. Yet another part of him dreaded facing the Second Coming with this new disgrace to account for.
IN THE PACIF
IC
7° N, 155° W
North of the Line Islands, between the trackless rolling swells and the flawless azure sky, a haze forms, quickly thickening into a mist, then a fog, then a raft of clouds, immaculate white at first, but darkening along the underbelly as it fattens outward and reaches upward, casting cooling shadow on the warm water below, which is raised to a gentle chop as the wind begins to blow.
18
Manhattan
"Damn that Pilgrim!" Dan said softly as the door shut behind the two CDC investigators. "Why can't he keep his big mouth shut?"
Poor Dan, Carrie thought as they stood together by the serving counter. She repressed a smile and laid a gentle hand on his arm.
"He doesn't know the trouble he's causing. Preacher's his friend. He was blind and now he can see. He witnessed a miracle and he wants to tell the world about it."
"And he seems to be doing just that—literally."
"Let him."
"Let him? I have no choice. And I wouldn't care, but now he's telling anybody who'll listen that if they're looking for a miracle cure, go to Loaves and Fishes!"
"And what if he does?"
"We just saw the result! Two guys from the CDC asking us about what we're serving the guests! Wanting to know if we're using any 'unusual' recipes! Good God, I thought I was going to have a heart attack!"
Carrie had to laugh now.
"What's so funny?" Dan said.
"You should have seen your face! You started choking while you were reading off the ingredients in my seven-grain bread!"
Dan's reluctant smile broke through. "I did fine until he asked me about any 'special additives!' That was when I almost lost it."
"You were very good. Very calm. The picture of innocence."
"I hope so. We don't need a bunch of epidemiologists sniffing around. I have visions of them doing these in-depth interviews with anyone around here who's been cured of anything in the past few months and entering it all into a computer, then asking the computer to find the common denominator and having it spit out, Loaves and Fishes . . . Loaves and Fishes . . . Loaves and Fishes, over and over again."
"Oh, Dan. Don't worry so much."
"I can't help it, Carrie. At the very least, we have a smuggled artifact in the basement. At the very most, if what you believe is true—"
"What I know is true. And you know it's true as well."
Dan blinked, tightened his lips, and gave his head a quick shake. Why wouldn't he let his lips speak what he knew in his heart?
"At the very most," he continued, "we're sitting on something that could shake up all of Christianity and Judaism, and possibly all of Islam as well."
"But no one but you and I will know," Carrie said patiently. How many times did she have to explain this to him? "The Virgin's existence was meant to be kept secret, and we are honoring that secret."
"But just moments ago we had two government investigators here!"
"So? Let's just suppose that when they'd asked you about any 'special additives,' you'd told them, 'Oh, yes. I almost forgot. We've got the Virgin Mary stashed away in the subcellar and we're adding smidges of her finely ground hair and fingernails to the soup.' What do you think they'd put in their report?"
Dan sighed. "Okay. You've got a point. But still . . ."
She reached across the counter and grasped his hand.
"Have faith, Dan. We're not alone in this. Everything's going to work out. Just believe."
Dan looked into her eyes and squeezed her hand in return.
"I used to believe in us, and look what happened to that."
Carrie's heart sank. Not this again.
"Dan . . . we've been through this already. Something bigger than you and I has come into our lives and we have to put our wants and desires aside. You said you understood."
"I do. At least partially. But even if I understood fully, I'd still be hurting. I haven't been able to put out the fire so easily."
But you must, she thought, hurting for him. You must.
"Don't the miracles make it easier?" she said, hoping to see the pain fade in his eyes. "Don't they make you feel a part of something glorious?"
"The cures are wonderful," he said.
"And they happened because of us! The blind see, the terminally ill are cured, the deranged become lucid. Because we brought her here."
"I just hope those same miracles aren't our downfall. Look what's happening around us. People are seeing the Virgin Mary everywhere, the streets are acrawl with epidemiologists by day and Mary-hunters by night, there's a candlelight vigil on every other corner, and every AIDS patient in the city seems to be trying to move to the Lower East Side. It's getting crazier by the minute out there. It all seems to be building toward something. But what? And if someone puts all the pieces together, we may find ourselves in big trouble, a lot more trouble than we can handle."
Carrie just shook her head. Didn't Dan know? Couldn't he feel it? Everything was going to be fine.
She is here.
Kesev had sensed that the instant his flight had touched down at JFK. Now he sat on a filthy bench in a litter-strewn park named after Sara D. Roosevelt, whoever she was. On the far side of the chain-link fence, across Forsythe Street, stretched a row of dilapidated houses, worse than in the poorest sections of the Arab Quarter in Jerusalem, except for the brightly colored and well kept building on the corner, the only clean structure on the block. Kesev had found it especially interesting because of the six-pointed star of David in the circular window near the top of its front gable. He'd thought it a temple at first, but had been confused by the inscription over the entrance: Templo Adventista del Septimo.
But much closer at hand—directly in front of him—was a hoarse-voiced street preacher. Lacking anything better to do, Kesev listened to his rant.
"Forget not what St. Paul said to the Thessalonians: 'The Day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night.' The End Times are soon upon us. First there will come the Rapture, then the Tribulation, and then the Son of God will come again. But only those who believe, only those who are saved will be caught up in the Rapture and spared the Tribulation. As Paul said to his church: 'But you, brothers, are not in darkness that that day will overcome you like a thief . . . For God has not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain deliverance by our Lord Jesus Christ!' Heed those words. Repent, believe, be not caught unprepared!"
"Amen, brothers!" cried his helper or disciple or whatever one might call the little man who followed him around like a puppy. "Amen! Preacher should know! Preacher was blind and now he can see! He sees everything*"
"First will come war—beware the false peace that surrounds us, for it exists but to lull us into laxity. Then will come plague and famine, followed by worldwide starvation. There will be a great shaking of the earth, the skies will darken, the seas will die, the River Jordan shall run red."
What nonsense is this? Kesev thought irritably. While I suffer the frustration of my fruitless search for the Mother, must I also suffer the words of fools and madmen? If he doesn't shut up I will wring his neck. And that of his prancing disciple as well.
Weeks here and no luck. Roaming these mean, sinister streets at night, hearing of the apparition, rushing to its reported location, always too late to see it. The frustration was making him ill tempered, building to a murderous rage. If something didn't break soon . . .
She must be aware that I am here. Why is she toying with me?
"You have four years, brothers and sisters," Preacher said. "Four years to repent and take Jesus as your Lord. For the year 2000 is soon upon us. And what more appropriate time than the end of the second millennium for the End Times? The setting of the second millennium will be followed by the dawn of the Second Coming of the Lord!"
The last two sentences shook Kesev. He hadn't realized the end of the second millennium was indeed upon the world. The epochal event of its departure dovetailed with his apprehensions about the meaning of the apocalyptic events of the summer.
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"Listen to him!" the little sidekick said. "Listen!" But the half-dozen people who had paused a moment to listen to the raggedy man had heard it all before, so they moved on. And with no audience, the man called Preacher and his lone disciple moved on as well.
Leaving Kesev and a thin, sickly looking old man sharing the bench.
Good riddance, Kesev thought.
Monsignor Vincenzo Riccio shifted his weight on the bench. His wasted buttocks offered no padding against the hard, rough planked surface. He wanted to get up and continue his search for the vision, but he didn't know which way to go in the fading light.
Fading like my body, he thought. Like my life. Slowly, steadily, inexorably.
He was beginning to think his chance to see the vision again would never come. He'd been traveling down from the Vatican mission to the Lower East Side night after night, hoping, praying, beseeching God and Jesus and Mary herself to honor him with the vision once more, just once more before the cancer took him. It had become a contest of sorts, a race between the tumor and his determination to last until he saw her again.
He glanced at the bearded man a few feet to his right.
"Do you think he's right?" he said.
The bearded man started, as if surprised that someone would speak to him. Most New Yorkers were shocked initially when a stranger like Vincenzo opened a conversation with them.
"Sorry. Do I think who is right?"
A strange accent. Middle Eastern, certainly, but where? The features framed by the beard and dark hair were Semitic. A Palestinian?
"The Preacher. Do you think we have only four years left until the Second Coming?"
"You mean, will the Second Coming of the Master coincide with the end of the second millennium?"
"Yes. The fin de millenaire. He's hardly the first to mention it, but it is an interesting concept, is it not?"
The bearded man nodded slowly. "But if that is true, if the Master is returning with the end of the millennium, then we do not have four years."
F Paul Wilson - Novel 03 Page 21
