"But you're not hearing me." Conscious of the pistol in my fanny pack, I stepped closer.
"All right, I gave you a chance to butt out!" The man spun toward me again. "Now it's your turn."
"Must be my lucky night."
He lunged.
The take-out coffee was in my left hand, the liquid so hot that it stung my fingers through the Styrofoam cup. I yanked the lid from the cup and threw the steaming contents at the man's face, aiming for his eyes.
The man shrieked and jerked his hands toward his scalded face.
I drove stiff fingers into his stomach, just below the V of the rib cage, the way I'd been taught.
Sounding as if he might vomit, the man doubled over. I kicked sideways toward a nerve that ran down the outside of his left thigh.
Paralyzed, his leg gave out, toppling him to the pavement, where he shrieked harder from the pain in his leg.
I yanked his hands from his face and drove the heel of my right palm against his nose, once, twice, three times. Cartilage cracked. I stepped back as blood spurted.
He dropped to the pavement and lay motionless. Ready to hit him again, I shoved him onto his side so the blood would drain from his nose. I felt for a pulse, found one, smelled his sour alcohol-saturated breath, and turned to the woman slumped in the car. "Are you all right?"
She moaned. I was appalled by the bruises on her face. "Are you strong enough to drive?" I asked. "I don't…" The woman was off-balance when I helped her from the car. Her lips were swollen. "Yes." She took a deep breath. "I think I can drive. But…" "Do it."
Behind me, the man groaned. "Hurry," I said. "Before he wakes up."
Through blackened eyes, the woman looked around in confusion. Bruises that deep couldn't develop in just a few minutes, I knew. They were the consequence of numerous other beatings.
"Drive?" she asked plaintively. "How? I ran here. I hoped I could borrow money from a girlfriend who works in this place. It turns out she called in sick. He was waiting instead."
Stooping beside the man on the pavement, I satisfied myself that he was still too dazed to realize what was going on. I pulled his car keys from his pants. Then I took his big wallet from his back pocket and removed all the money he had-what looked like a hundred dollars.
"Here," I told the woman. I pulled out my own wallet and gave her most of the cash I had-around two hundred. "I can't accept this," she said.
"My wife would have wanted me to give it to you."
"What are you talking about?"
"Take this. Please. Because of my wife."
The woman looked at me strangely, as if trying to decipher a riddle. "I have a sister in Baltimore," she said as I gave her the man's car keys.
"No, it's the first place he'll look," I said. "If you'd robbed a bank, would you hide at your sister's? Too obvious. You have to pretend that you're running from the police."
"But I haven't done anything wrong!"
"Keep telling yourself that. You haven't done anything wrong. But that son of a bitch over there certainly has. You have to keep reminding yourself that your only goal in life is to stay away from him." In Denver, when life had been normal, I'd been proud of the volunteer work Kate had done as a stress counselor at a shelter for battered women. I knew the drill. "Pick a city where you've never been. Pittsburgh." I chose it at random. "Have you ever been to-"
"No."
"Then go to Pittsburgh. It's only a couple of hundred miles from here. Leave the car at a bus station, and go to Pittsburgh. Look in the phone book under 'Community Services.' Look for the number of the women's shelter."
7
I trembled in my motel room, amazed by the rage that had overtaken me. For a moment, as the bastard had come at me, I'd almost shot him. The only thing that had stopped me was the realization that the shot would have sent people scurrying from the restaurant. Someone might have seen me. The police would have come after me. How could I have looked for Kate and Jason if I were in jail?
8
For reasons important to my family and me, my E-mail said, I'm looking for information about a young man who might have come to your church in the late summer or in the fall nineteen years ago. I realize that it's hard to remember that far bach, but I think that the circumstances would have been unusual enough that someone in your congregation would recall him. The boy would have been in his mid-teens. He would have collapsed against the front door of your church early before Sunday services, so that the first person to arrive would have found him there. He would have been wearing torn clothes and would have had scrapes and scratches, suggesting that he'd been in an accident of some sort. He wouldn't have been able to recall his name or what had happened to him or how he had come to be at your church. Members of the congregation would have taken care of him- in particular, women-because something about his eyes invites mothering. He would have been able to quote the Bible from memory but otherwise would have been unable to read or write. Someone, probably a woman, would have tried to teach him. Ultimately, he would have stolen from the people who helped him, perhaps have beaten them also, and have fled town. It may be that near the end he "remembered" that his name was Lester Dant. If you have any knowledge of someone like this, please send me an E-mail at the above address. I very much need to learn everything I can about this person. A year ago, he kidnapped my wife and son.
9
The next morning, after a torturous sleep, I sent that message to the E-mail address of every church on my list. Staring at my computer screen, I silently asked God to help me. All I could do now was wait.
The need to urinate finally made me move. But once in motion, I remembered Payne's remark that as long as I stayed in motion, I was less likely to do something foolish to myself. I went for a five-mile run. I returned and checked to see if I had any E-mail. Nothing. I did an hour of exercises, then checked my E-mail again. Still nothing.
What did I expect? That someone at each church would faithfully read the church's E-mail every morning, that word of my message would spread instantly throughout each congregation, that people who remembered something like the events I'd described would immediately send an E-mail back to me? I have to be patient, I warned myself. Even in small towns, news doesn't get around as fast as I want it to. If there's a reply to be had, I probably won't receive it until evening.
So I showered, dressed, and tried to read. I went out and got a sandwich. I took a walk. I watched CNN. But mostly I kept checking to see if any E-mail had arrived. None did. By midnight, I gave up, shut off the lights, and tried to sleep.
But unconsciousness wouldn't come, and finally, betraying my resolve of the previous night, I went down the road to a bar and grill, where I wasn't likely to be recognized. If the man I'd beaten was looking for me, the logical place he'd do it was the restaurant across from the motel. This time, it took four beers and a shot of bourbon before I felt stupefied enough to go back to my room and try to sleep. I'm going to hell, I told myself.
I am in hell.
Around dawn, I woke, but there still wasn't any message. I faced another day of waiting. Time dragged on, until I admitted that I'd been a fool to have hoped. I hadn't been brave enough to identify with Lester Dant as closely as I'd needed to. I'd been wrong in my prediction of where he'd gone nineteen years previously and of what he'd done when he'd arrived there. Vowing that I couldn't persist in leading my life the way I was, wondering if I wanted to lead my life at all, I checked my E-mail and tensed at the discovery of four messages.