by John Manning
Martine headed back over to Rachel Muir. The two women shook their heads at each other, in sympathy for a teenaged girl and her broken heart.
“When I was your age, Heidi,” Martine was saying, “I had this boyfriend just like Billy. A regular Casanova, he was. The girls flocked around him like moths to a flame. But you get over them…”
She looked back in the girl’s direction.
Heidi had slipped off her chair and was lying on floor. She wasn’t moving.
Martine screamed.
34
“You want anything else, Mike?” Wally Bingham called from across the counter.
The Yellow Bird was empty, except for Mike deSalis. The supper shift was finished, and Marjorie was in the back, doing dishes. Everyone else had cleared out except for Mike, who’d been sitting in a booth for over two hours, just staring into his glass of Coke, which had been refilled at least ten times.
“No,” Mike replied. “I’m just waiting on Billy.”
Wally looked at his watch. “Well, if he was coming by for supper, I’m getting ready to close up the kitchen.”
Mike sighed. “He’s with his new girlfriend. They’re always having serious conversations.”
“You know how guys are with new girls,” Wally said.
Mike just shrugged.
Wally looked over at him, and thought to himself, The boy doesn’t look all right.
He walked around the counter and dropped down into the booth across from him. “Is everything okay, Mike?”
The boy looked at him. His eyes were glassy, his face pale. “I’m fine, Mr. Bingham. I’ll get out of here in a minute if Billy doesn’t show up.”
“Look, Mike, I noticed when you went to the bathroom a little while ago that you were weaving a little bit.” He gave him a look of concern. “Level with me. You been drinking? High on something? I won’t tell the cops. I just want to make sure you get home okay.”
Mike looked at him, his eyes rolling a bit. “No, Mr. Bingham, I didn’t. I don’t know—I just don’t feel that good today.”
“Let me call Billy. What’s his cell number?”
“Billy.” Mike laughed, and his head lolled a bit. “Billy’s too busy with that girl from Wilbourne to bother with me anymore. Just please, can I sit here for a minute longer? Maybe could I—could I have a glass of water?”
“Sure.”
Wally hustled back behind the counter. I can’t let him walk out of here. Maybe I can get Marjorie to give him a lift home. He glanced back over at Mike. The boy’s head was down on the table now. Wally carried the ice water back over to Mike and set it down in front of him.
“There you go, son.”
Mike picked his head up, and smiled at Wally. It was a pasty, weak smile, but his eyes—his eyes…
Jesus God, Wally thought.
The boy’s eyes were bright red.
And in an instant, Wally could see flames. Everywhere he looked there were flames. He could smell the smoke, and hot cinders were falling from the fires that blazed across the ceiling. He could see even beyond his café—every building downtown was on fire. Even the trees and the grass in the square were aflame. There was a roar as the gas tank of a truck ignited and blew sky high. Wally could hear screaming voices begging and crying out for help. And then suddenly, there was the sound of a trumpet blaring, so loud that it hurt Wally’s ears.
“Thanks, Mr. Bingham.”
The flames were gone. Wally felt as if he might lose his balance as he stood there watching the boy drink the water.
What the fuck kind of hallucination was that?
“I have the worst dreams,” Mike was whispering, looking up at him. He sounded drunk. “They are so terrible, Mr. Bingham, and I’m so tired all day, and I’m going to lose my scholarship…And my head—my head hurts so bad sometimes, it feels like it’s going to split wide open and sometimes I wish it would—”
Wally steadied himself against the back of the booth. What the hell was going on here?
The bell over the door rang, and just as Wally started to turn to see who it was, Mike grabbed his arm, digging his nails into the skin.
“Hey!” Wally cried, trying to yank his arm away. He turned back in shock, only to see that Mike’s eyes had widened in absolute terror, his mouth forming a perfect circle. His pupils were completely dilated, and his face was drained completely of color.
“Grill still open, Wally?” Billy Honeycutt was calling from the doorway. A blond girl stood at his side
But Wally couldn’t take his eyes off Mike. The boy was gasping for air. With a final jerk of his shoulder, Wally managed to wrench his arm out of Mike’s grasp. Bloody half-moons were cut into his skin from Mike’s nails.
Mike was stuttering as if in utter terror, his finger pointing at the front door.
“Mike, it’s Billy,” Wally told him.
But Mike only started screaming. He stood up from the booth as if to run, but he seemed unable to move. He fell straight backward. For Wally it seemed almost in slow motion. He grabbed out for the boy, but his fingers just brushed against his shirt. There was a horrible thud as Mike’s head hit the floor. Wally felt nauseated as Mike’s head actually bounced up before falling again with another thud.
Both he and Billy were immediately at Mike’s side. “Mike!” Billy was screaming. “Mike, are you okay?”
Mike opened his eyes and smiled up at them, “Everything is going to be all right now,” he said in a startlingly clear voice. Then his eyes rolled back into his head.
Behind them, the blond girl was screaming.
Years of military training kicked in and Wally started performing CPR.
“Call an ambulance!” he shouted at Billy as he started pumping Mike’s chest. “Don’t die, Mike, don’t die, please God, don’t die…”
35
With shaking fingers, Sue flipped open her cell phone and pressed 911.
“You have to get an ambulance to the Yellow Bird diner!” she shouted at the operator. “Mike deSalis just collapsed, and they’re trying CPR, but I don’t think he’s breathing. Please hurry!”
She hung up, watching Mr. Bingham pump Mike’s chest. Billy was saying, “Come on, Mike, come on, Mike.”
Marjorie, the waitress, had appeared behind the counter, her hands wet and soapy. “Should I call his parents?” she asked.
No one answered her.
Sue felt helpless, useless. She knew CPR—she’d learned it at Stowe in swimming class—but there was nothing for her to do. Mr. Bingham was working on Mike, but seemed to be having no luck. What had happened to Mike? He’d stood when he saw them come in, pointed at them, then fallen down. Sue saw the agony on Billy’s face as he looked at his stricken friend. She wanted to go to him, put her arms around him, and hold him, but she was afraid of getting in the way.
“Come on, come on,” Mr. Bingham said, his forehead glistening with sweat as he started pumping on Mike’s chest again.
Sue sagged down into the booth nearest the door and wiped her eyes with her hands. She didn’t want to watch anymore, couldn’t watch anymore. She took some deep breaths.
Why do I feel as if this is my fault?
It was crazy, but that’s how she felt.
“Come on, Mike!” Billy was shouting. “Come on, buddy, I know you can do it!”
Sue heard Marjorie dialing a phone in the kitchen, then speaking in a low, hushed voice. Was she calling Mike’s parents?
Outside, an ambulance siren. Sue jumped up and ran to the door, but the ambulance was heading in the other direction.
“No!” Sue cried, running outside waving her arms. “Over here.”
She could see the ambulance at the end of the block now, stopping in front of Martine’s Boutique.
Sue began to run. “Fools!” she screamed. “I said the Yellow Bird!”
Her legs took great strides as she ran. She knew every moment was critical. Crossing Baker Street, she barely looked in each direction, just took a chance and ran across the side street, keeping
her eyes on the ambulance. Paramedics were rushing out of it by now, carrying equipment into the boutique.
“No!” Sue shouted. “Over here!”
She reached the door of the boutique. She looked inside.
Paramedics were bending over a girl on the floor, as the hairdresser in her white smock and a customer with wet hair huddled watching in a corner.
Sue saw the girl’s face.
It was Heidi.
Billy’s girlfriend.
Behind her, she heard the whine of another ambulance. She glanced up the street. This one stopped outside the Yellow Bird.
Sue pulled back, staggering out onto the sidewalk.
What is happening?
And why do I feel as if I am the cause of it all?
She was afraid. Suddenly, she was very afraid.
36
“She’s in here,” Father Ortiz said, gesturing for Ginny to follow him.
Ginny took a deep breath. Passing through the kitchen in the deSalis’s small house, she inhaled the fragrance of lilacs. It was far too late in the season for lilacs, but when Ginny rounded the corner into the living room, she saw that dozens of vases were filled with the aromatic purple flowers.
“Strangest thing,” Father Ortiz told her over his shoulder. “A day after Bernadette came home from the hospital, all the bushes in the yard began sprouting new flowers.”
Ginny’s eyes came to rest on the young girl seated on the couch. She seemed to be expecting Ginny. Her hands were folded in her lap clasping a rosary. She was dressed in a long white dress, and her dark hair was tied back in a long ponytail. On either side of her on the couch sat her parents.
“Bernadette,” Father Ortiz said, “this is the lady I told you about. She is a good lady. Her name is Virginia Marshall.” He smiled. “Her parents named her for Our Lady.”
Bernadette smiled.
“Hello,” Ginny said. She didn’t extend her hand. She just looked down at the girl, who looked back at her with interested eyes.
“Hello,” Bernadette replied, and gave her a bright smile.
This was not the little girl she had expected to find. Gayle Honeycutt had described a girl who was near comatose. Father Ortiz had told Ginny that for days Bernadette had been mostly unresponsive. But now she was alert and smiling.
“Bernadette,” Father Ortiz was saying, “I was hoping you’d let Dr. Marshall ask you some questions.”
Pierre deSalis seemed anxious. “You sure, Father?” he asked. “You sure this won’t upset her? I don’t want Bernie getting upset. She’s coming along so much better now…”
“I won’t upset her,” Ginny said. “I just want to hear whatever she might want to tell me.”
“And she has a great deal to say!” Mrs. deSalis told her, eyes wide, almost crazy. “She has a message from Our Holy Virgin Mother. A very important message!”
“Please, Dr. Marshall,” Father Ortiz said. “Sit down.” He gestured to the chair opposite Bernadette. Ginny took a seat.
“Is that so, Bernadette?” Ginny asked. “Do you have a message you want to share?”
“Yes, I do,” she said clearly and evenly, her hands still folded in her lap. “Our Lady told me about you, Dr. Marshall.”
“Did she?” Ginny asked.
Bernadette nodded. “She told me one would come along who could help. Who needed to hear the message.” She smiled broadly. “And that one is you.”
“Well,” Ginny said, “I’m all ears.”
“First, I need to ask,” Bernadette said. “Are you a believer in Our Lord Jesus Christ?”
“That depends on how you define believer,” Ginny replied. “I respect the teachings of Jesus. I think Jesus was a great teacher, with a great message for mankind.”
Bernadette smiled. “But was he the Son of God?”
“Certainly as much as Buddha, or Mohammad, or as much as you and I are children of God,” Ginny said. “If you are asking whether I believe in Jesus’ divinity—well, I’d have to be honest and say that I have no way of knowing that.”
Bernadette’s smile only grew. “I am pleased that you are honest, Dr. Marshall. That is very important. Our Lady said that the one I could trust would be an honest person. And I can see that you are. You don’t simply say what you think I might want to hear in order that I might talk to you.”
“I won’t lie to you, Bernadette, just as I’m sure you won’t lie to me.”
The girl closed her eyes, then opened them again. “I see that you teach about the sacred feminine.”
“Yes. Have you read my book? Has Father Ortiz told you about my work?”
“Not a word,” Father Ortiz told her.
“I have read nothing about you,” Bernadette said. “I didn’t even know your name until you just walked in. But I know what you teach, Dr. Marshall.”
Ginny shifted in her chair. “Tell me more.”
“When I saw the Blessed Mother, she did not look the way I had always imagined her,” Bernadette said. “You know what I mean. Dressed in blue, surrounded by a halo, hands clasped in supplication, demure and saintly.” The girl laughed—a laugh far older than her years. “Do you know how she appeared to me, Dr. Marshall?”
“Tell me, please.”
Bernadette smiled. “She was riding a lion, and she carried a bow and quiver, and a sword.”
Ginny’s mouth opened, but words did not form right away.” Ishtar…” It was the only word she could utter.
“Was that her name?” Bernadette seemed to be asking a genuine question. “I did not know her name…”
“Ishtar,” Ginny repeated. “The great Mother Goddess of the ancient Babylonians, invoked for battles.”
“Yes, Our Lady was dressed for battle, for indeed a battle awaits,” Bernadette told her. “A few nights later, she appeared again to me in my dreams. Only this time, she rode a tiger, and she had eight arms—and in each hand, she carried a weapon.”
“Durga,” Ginny said, stunned. “The Mother Goddess of the Hindus. The destroyer of demons…”
“Precisely,” Bernadette said.
“Then you didn’t have a vision of the Virgin Mary,” Ginny told her. “You had visions of ancient goddesses…”
“But what is it that you teach about the sacred feminine, Dr. Marshall?” Bernadette asked, leaning toward her almost imperceptibly.
Suddenly, Ginny understood. “That ultimately they are all the same,” she breathed. A chill ran through her body.
Bernadette smiled. “When I look at her over there,” she said, nodding across the room, where a statue of the Virgin sat surrounded by lilacs, “I see her as clearly as I did when she appeared to me. Though we cannot see it, her sword is still strapped to her side. I am confident of that. She is not as submissive as she appears. Like any mother, she will fight for her Son—for all of her children.”
Ginny was stunned. It seemed impossible that this girl should know so much. If Bernadette was telling the truth—if Father Ortiz was telling the truth—then this was the most radical Virgin sighting Ginny had ever encountered.
“But tell me,” she said, leaning forward toward Bernadette, her hands imploring. “What was the message that she gave you? What is this battle you say is approaching?”
Ginny steeled herself for the answer. This was the part that Father Ortiz had seemed most anxious about. The answer to this question was what he most feared.
Just then the phone rang, shattering the silence. Everyone—except for Bernadette—jumped. Mr. and Mrs. deSalis looked at each other, startled and annoyed by the interruption, yet neither moved to answer it. The phone rang again. And then again. And again.
Finally, Mr. deSalis stood and rushed across the room into the kitchen. In a hushed voice, he answered the phone.
They could hear him in the living room. “Mike?” His voice was a whisper. “What’s wrong with Mike?”
“And so,” Bernadette said, overhearing, a terribly sad look crossing her face. “It begins.”
From t
he kitchen Mr. deSalis shrieked, “No!”
His wife stood now and hurried into the other room as well. Father Ortiz followed.
Bernadette motioned to Ginny to draw near.
“I will tell you now,” she whispered. “For you must hear Our Lady’s message. The time is late. We must begin.”
Ginny stood and moved over to sit on the couch beside Bernadette, in the spot vacated by Mrs. deSalis.
“Tell me,” she said.
And so Bernadette did.
37
“He dropped right over there,” Marjorie was telling Miles and Perry Holland. “I came out of the kitchen and Mike was on the floor, and Wally was doing CPR.”
“Was it a heart attack?” Perry asked. “It would be strange in a kid so young, but not unheard of.”
Marjorie shrugged. “Well, that’s what they’re still trying to find out.”
Miles brought a forkful of hash browns to his lips. “Kid’s been in the hospital now for four days,” he said just before taking a bite. “You’d think they’d figure out what was wrong with him by now,” he added, mouth full.
“Well,” Marjorie said, leaning on her elbows on the counter, “what’s really odd is that at the same moment, down the street at the boutique, one of Mike’s classmates was having a similar attack. She just dropped, and she’s been in the hospital now the same amount of time he has.”
“Who’s that?” Perry asked.
“Heidi Swettenham. The girl Billy Honeycutt dumped for that Wilbourne girl.”
Perry paused, holding his cup of coffee in midair. “What Wilbourne girl?’
“Oh, I don’t remember her name.” Marj started wiping down the counter. “I’m getting old. What’s the use of being the town gossip if you can’t remember names? Susan…Sue…something.”
A little bell went off in Perry’s head. “Not Sue Barlow?”
“Yes,” Marj said, nodding. “That’s the one. Know her?”
Perry shook his head. “No. I just gave her a warning for speeding, that’s all.”
He and his father exchanged glances. Perry had filled Miles in about the daughter of Mariclare Barlow attending Wilbourne this year. But they’d both dismissed any thought of following up on the coincidence, since Mariclare Barlow had returned home safe and sound twenty years ago. Unlike the other girls, she didn’t remain missing or turn up murdered and dismembered.
