Every night, the same questions surfaced and every night, Sam fought back the doubt and retained his faith.
If Satan was the one prompting these bitter feelings of distrust and despair, he would not succeed.
“I am stronger,” said Sam out loud, his prayer complete. He prepared for bed. He forced his thoughts forward.
He knew that leaving this house and its deeply etched memories, even for a short while, would do wonders for his soul. Tomorrow, he was leaving on vacation with a group of friends to visit one of God’s natural wonders, a faraway atoll known as Kiritimati Island. Kiritimati was the local spelling for the word Christmas. A British navigator discovered the island on Christ’s birthday.
Being surrounded by friends and sea would provide an ideal environment for healing. The island’s warmth and beauty would reinforce in him the splendor of God’s world.
Earlier that week, he had told his confirmation students about the pending trip. A substitute would take his place the following week. He regretted missing even one session with them, a blossoming group of seventh and eighth graders preparing for the most important event of their Christianity, a coming of age in faith. This was a delicate turning point in their lives, choosing the right path with commitment and an understanding of the history of the church, its rituals and scriptures.
Sam felt closeness with his students and responsibility for their upbringing, a relationship that filled a void in his own life. He and Susanna had not been able to conceive a child. He took it as a sign that his children extended beyond his own blood lineage and he accepted the role with passion and faith.
As a final act before climbing into bed, Sam removed the towel from the clock, bringing illumination back to the room.
10:35 P.M.
He felt a tremendous familiarity with this moment, the unveiling of the clock before resting his head, a strange but constant reminder of his own countdown clock.
Susanna’s time had come and his time was equally inevitable. The only difference was the number of days, hours, minutes and seconds before departing from this mortal world. Sam knew that as long as he lived a good life of faith, the reward of reunion awaited at death.
Part Two
Kiritimati
Chapter Six
After hours of endless blue sea, a small land mass appeared, truly in the middle of nowhere. Kelly Martinez pressed closer to the window of the Boeing 737, observing Kirbati’s sprawling collection of low-lying coral atolls, a crisscross of channels and islands that included Kiritimati.
“We’re here,” she said to her husband in the next seat. She elbowed him gently to wake him. “You’ve got to check this out.”
Rodney stirred and tilted in her direction. He looked out at the unspoiled miles of flats and lagoons, a fisherman’s paradise. “Ah, yes,” he said, breaking out in a smile.
Rodney turned to his other side to alert his friend in the aisle seat. “Gary, check this out. Can you see?”
Gary stretched and maneuvered until he caught a glimpse. “Land ho!” he said. The destination had required two days of travel, most of it over water with a stopover in Honolulu.
“Look at the colors,” said Rodney.
“Hey, Emma,” said Gary to his wife.
Emma sat in the seat across the aisle from him. He playfully tossed an ice cube from his drink to secure her attention.
She glared at him, unamused, brushing away the piece of ice. “You got Sam wet.”
Sam, seated next to her, laughed it off. “I thought we weren’t going to see any rain during this trip,” he said. He closed his book, the memoir of a city dweller discovering spiritual healing during a year spent in the Alaskan wilderness.
“Everybody awake?” asked Jake Henning in the row behind Emma and Sam. He stood up and lifted his camera. “Photo op. Arrival at Christmas Island. Let’s get some smiling faces.” His companions turned to look at him, responding with waves, grins and thumbs up. He snapped photos until his wife Carol gently tugged at his shirt.
“I don’t think you should be standing, they’ll get mad,” she said softly. “We’re about to land.”
“This is for our photo journal.”
“I know, but it’s the rules.”
He squeezed in a few more shots, then sat back down.
“And your seatbelt,” she told him.
He secured it and told her, “Sweetie, are you grouchy?”
“No. I’m sorry. Just tired. I don’t sleep well on airplanes. I keep thinking about work. I should have brought my laptop.”
Jake grew irritated. “Forget that place. They work you to death. They don’t pay you what you’re worth. You never should have pulled that all-nighter before we left. You should have said, ‘Too bad. This is my vacation. It’s been scheduled for almost a year.’”
“I know, I know,” she said softly. “I’m sorry. You’re right.”
He looked at her and sighed. “Yes. I’m right. They’re right. Everybody’s right. That’s the problem. You need to think for yourself. Don’t be so accommodating all the time. You’re too smart for that. Okay?”
She nodded. “You’re right.”
He immediately responded, “Case in point.”
“What?”
“Never mind. Look out the window. It’s gorgeous out there. Your job is to enjoy this vacation.”
Carol turned toward the rounded window. She looked down at the long stretch of coral atolls embraced in white sand and a maze-like network of lagoons that broke the landscape into pieces. There was no whole.
She moved her eyes to the long coastline and crashing of ocean waves against the reef. As the plane descended, she witnessed a sudden, isolated red flash, like a burst of colored lightning along a small section of shoreline.
The strange sight happened so quickly and out of context that her head jerked back from the window.
“Did you see that?” Carol asked her husband.
Jake was focused on his camera, checking out some of the images he had just captured. “See what?” he asked, without looking up. Then he laughed at one of the pictures. “Hah. Look at Gary.”
Carol looked across the seats at her travel companions and started to ask “Did anyone see…?” But her voice was not strong enough to draw attention and no one appeared caught up in any unusual sightings.
Carol turned back to the window. She waited for a return of the red flash. When it didn’t happen again, she said, “The sun and water create some strange illusions.”
“It’s the equator,” said Jake, still preoccupied with his camera.
“I’m so tired I’m hallucinating,” said Carol.
“What?” asked Jake.
“Nothing.” She sighed.
The plane continued its descent, aimed for Kiritimati’s one runway, a small strip of cement cutting through low shrubs. After landing, the group disembarked and collected their baggage planeside within minutes.
“I wish O’Hare was this fast,” remarked Gary.
They walked a short distance to line up for customs and immigration with a handful of other tourists inside Cassidy International Airport, a modest cinderblock building with a tin roof. An official in shorts with a rubber stamp recited a few basic questions without expressing interest in the answers.
Returning outside, the Chicago travelers donned sunglasses and gathered around Gary, who knew the most about Kiritimati, having studied up and led the trip planning.
“Our guide is going to meet us,” said Gary. “He’ll take us to the hotel.” Within minutes a rugged, tanned man with bright blue eyes and a broad smile stepped forward with a clipboard to greet them. He introduced himself as Simon, an Australian angler. He vigorously shook everyone’s hand.
“When does the bus arrive?” asked Rodney.
“It’s here.” Simon laughed. He gestured to an open-air flatbed
truck with benches. A driver in a straw hat sat in the front. “We’re not going far.”
Simon joined the seven vacationers in the back of the truck for the bumpy, 15-minute trip to the hotel. They traveled a patchwork of paved and dirt roads on the dry terrain, encountering only a few other vehicles —most of them crowded with villagers, sometimes hanging precariously to the sides. Scooters made occasional appearances, zipping by with young riders in bare feet who stared at the arriving visitors. A constant breeze coated everything with dust. Emma wiped her sunglasses several times, muttering asides to her husband.
“We rarely get rain here,” said Simon. “Droughts are common. Because of this, the crops are limited. The island’s largest crop is coconut, some papayas and breadfruit. The soil is not good. We fly in meats and vegetables from Hawaii once a week.”
Simon pointed out sights along their route. As they drove through a coconut plantation, he drew their attention to the plastic bottles hanging high in the trees. “They collect the coconut sap. It’s very tasty, like syrup,” he said.
“That’s our police station,” he announced, as the truck rolled past a very small, unmarked cinderblock structure with a door and one window, not much larger than a child’s playhouse.
Rodney took it in and announced, “I will never again complain about the facilities of the Rogers Park precinct.”
One stretch of scenery was littered with large hunks of rusted scrap metal. Simon identified the debris as remnants of the US and British military presence in the fifties and sixties. “The cleanup has been ongoing, literally for decades.”
This prompted Jake to begin asking questions about the island’s history as a nuclear testing site.
“I can assure you, there’s no radioactivity,” said Simon. “It’s been tested many times over. It’s very safe now. Even the birds have returned. Millions were killed during the testing, it was very bleak for a long time. Those days are over. The beauty of the island is back.”
As if to punctuate his statement, the pickup truck reached an open area dominated by a stunning white sand beach leading to a glittering, blue-green tropical lagoon.
“Look at that,” said Kelly, and she took Rodney’s hand.
Jake immediately began snapping photos.
“Tonight we’ll plan out your fishing trips for the week,” said Simon. “We’re going to spend time wading in the flats. We can also take boats offshore along the coral reefs.”
“My goal is the trevally,” said Gary. “I want a giant trevally, a hundred-pounder.”
“The trevally,” smiled Simon. “We call it the Monster Fish.”
The truck continued up the beach to the hotel, a plain flat building stretched across the ocean front. “The hotel is a former military base,” said Simon as the vehicle reached a stop.
“So, we’re staying in army barracks?” asked Rodney, standing up in the back of the truck.
Gary laughed and waved their attention closer to the ocean. “No, not us. Take a look over there. That’s where we’re staying.”
All eyes moved to a collection of private, thatched bungalows, just steps from the beach and perfectly positioned to take in the full beauty of the ocean and surrounding shore.
Gary continued, “They’re totally modern inside, bathrooms, clean beds, a fridge. There’s even air-conditioning, but you won’t need it. You’ll want to open the windows. There’s nothing like sleeping with an ocean breeze and the sound of the waves rolling in.”
The seven visitors stepped off the rear of the pickup truck, mesmerized by the setting.
“Spectacular,” said Rodney, and he turned to Kelly and kissed her on the cheek. “Welcome to paradise, honey.”
Carol yawned.
“Knock it off,” Jake teased her.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sleepy. But it really is beautiful.”
Then Sam, who had been silent for most of the trip, spoke. He beamed at his surroundings, soaking them in, nodding with satisfaction as if everything was right in the world.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” he said. “It’s just like heaven.”
Chapter Seven
In an open dining hall overlooking the pristine beach, the vacationers crowded the room’s largest table, feasted on fresh lobster, octopus and clams, and reflected on the past several days of adventures with enthusiasm.
The hotel manager visited to personally share in the conversation and called them the nicest group of American tourists he had ever served. He spoke fluent English in direct contrast to most of the staff and islanders, who stuck to the local language, Gilbertese.
“We’re trying to grow our tourism,” he told the table of guests. “Small right now but word of mouth is good.”
“Don’t grow too much,” advised Gary. “That’s part of the charm. No commercialism. Not a McDonald’s or Starbucks in sight.”
“All you need is this weather and the incredible fishing,” said Rodney with a broad grin. “Don’t spoil it. It’s perfect the way it is.”
The temperatures throughout the trip had remained steady in the eighties with a cooling ocean breeze and no rain. The island’s enormous sprawl of flats and shallow reef meant very little encroachment of other anglers. At times, the island truly felt like a private paradise to its visitors.
The night before, the hotel treated its guests to a luau, complete with roasted pig, lively dancing and an exuberant musical performance by members of the staff, decorated in colorful native dress.
For the visitors from Chicago, the stress of their lives back home stripped away in layers with each passing day. Sam expressed he was finding inner peace and healing. “It’s very therapeutic,” he said.
“This is a real vacation,” said Jake, surrounded by fresh seafood. “Not like last year. We took the kids to one of those big indoor water parks. That was the worst. Standing in line staring at some fat guy’s bacne for 30 minutes to go down a 30-second slide into a pool filled with Band-Aids and phlegm.” He turned to his wife. “Remember that, hon?”
“It was more for the kids,” said Carol with a gentle smile. “They had a good time.”
“Right,” said Jake. “And this trip is your turn to have fun and relax.”
Carol’s mind wandered to the children. “I wonder how they’re doing. I hope they’re getting enough to eat. Do you think we should…”
“No,” said Jake. “They’re fine. They’re big boys. They’re teenagers, not babies. Remember, we weren’t going to worry about them. And we weren’t going to talk about work.” He looked across the table at Gary. “Our first two nights here, all she could do was fret over the kids and worry about her boss and some bank presentation…”
“It was a very important presentation,” said Carol.
“I don’t know why you bust your ass to make that woman look good,” said Jake. “She just takes all the credit. It’s not fair.”
“Ha,” said Gary. “Now you’re the one talking about the office.”
Jake groaned. “Touché. Let’s change the subject. Let’s talk about something that really matters.” The conversation promptly returned to fishing: effective lures, leaders, hot spots and the ones that got away. The four men had spent most of the past few days fly-fishing in ankle-deep flats, where schools of bonefish traveled the clean inland water, plentiful and visible yet fierce fighters to the end. The men had caught dozens in the 5 to 10 pound range.
For the first two days, Simon accompanied them to prime locations at the right times and tides. Simon helped spot fish for the guests and shared stories about the island and its history. When Rodney asked more questions about the nuclear tests from the 1950s and 1960s, Simon quickly dismissed them. “That was a long time ago,” he said. “It doesn’t matter now. The fish, the wildlife, everything is clean.”
Gary’s personal passion was catching the notorious giant trevall
y, a powerful species that could reach weights of more than 100 pounds. One morning, wading in the flats, a giant trevally three feet long nearly bumped into him before making a hasty escape. “I can still see its dorsal fin,” said Gary, reminiscing at dinner. “I’m not leaving here until I catch one.”
“Be prepared for a nasty tug of war,” said Jake.
“Did you see Simon’s scar?” asked Sam. “It runs across his fingertips where a trevally bit down and wouldn’t let go. Those things are monsters.”
“Well, tomorrow we go monster hunting,” said Gary. “The boat guy is going to be here any minute with the maps.”
For their final day on the island, the four men planned to take the fishing offshore into the Big Blue. The interior lagoon had provided phenomenal fishing, but the deeper coastal waters beyond the coral reef promised a special bounty. Gary, an experienced boater, had arranged to charter an outrigger with a full tank of gas and dismissed the need for a guide, partly out of pride and partly out of budget.
The women had made their own plans to snorkel in the morning and shop in the village in the afternoon. During the first few days, they had accompanied their spouses for the fishing expeditions, experiencing some successes of their own, but with a less obsessive fervor for the sport. More recently, the two groups split off each morning for different day trips. While Kelly and Carol had been quite content to explore the beaches, collect seashells and go bird watching, Emma had been less positive about her options and expressed occasional boredom. “The men should have left us off in Honolulu,” she said. “This place is like a Third World country and just getting around is murder on my hip.”
Rice pudding arrived for dessert. As Gary started to dig in, a tall, lean Kiribatian with tight, sunken features shyly approached, clutching an assortment of papers.
Anatomy of Evil Page 3
