“And you’re willing to take all this at face value, doctor?” Sam asked under his breath. “Did you not initially hire Nina to validate your suspicions so that you and Dr. Victor could get something out of it? Fame and money?” Sam jested, smiling.
“Yes, we did, son,” Dr. Hooper smiled. “But I speak for both myself and old Glen when I say that we are far from greedy. With such a lovely lady’s life on the line, nothing is more important to me than giving you all the facts I can to help you get her back.”
“Thanks Dr. Hooper,” Sam said. “I really appreciate your truthfulness with this. Hopefully they will trade Nina, if I play my cards right.”
Dr. Hooper leaned in to whisper, throwing a quick pointed finger at Jan Harris outside on the steps. “See if you can trade that one. Not much of a loss there.”
Sam threw back his head and laughed. “Excuse my villainy,” the doctor smiled.
“Oh, no, please,” Sam laughed, “do not apologize. You share a very common consensus, Dr. Hooper. Very common!”
“Sam, we have to go,” Father Harper reminded him in a soft voice that traveled surprisingly far.
“Be right there, Father,” Sam answered. “Dr. Hooper, please be careful. These animals killed some of your staff. They know you meant to hide the bodies of their men and they know that you know about the curious markings. After all, you hired Nina to delve into it and they know that too. You get what I’m saying here?”
“I should take my sick days and my annual leave for a bit of a sabbatical?” Dr. Hooper asked rhetorically.
Sam nodded. “Aye, sir. Exactly. You have my e-mail address, should you need me, right?”
“Yes, yes, I do, son. Now go on and get back Dr. Gould,” Dr. Barry Hooper urged hopefully. He watched the three leave and locked himself in his office for the rest of the evening.
Jan Harris threw a few garments into her travel bag while Sam and Father Harper waited outside. Under a mild early evening the two dark-haired men stood, enjoying the coolness under the reddened clouds of sunset. Sam was sucking on a Marlboro, while he explained his motives for saving Toshana, the message on the footage, and Harris’ compromising role as middleman for the deal.
“So she has you cornered,” Father Harper said, after listening to Sam’s confession.
“Aye, Father,” Sam said indifferently. “I have to give her the story, which is alright. But if they hurt Nina, I will personally rip Harris…”
“Hey, hey,” Father Harper halted Sam’s hateful threat. “Just concentrate on Nina, understand?”
Sam sighed, flicking his cigarette into the pond under the trees. “Father, you always elude questions about your past.”
“And will continue to do so while it has no significance in conversation,” the dark priest added nonchalantly, hoping that he made it clear to Sam that prying was not allowed. However, he feared that his previous vocation was becoming more and more prevalent these days.
“Just tell me this,” Sam insisted. “How do these men know you? Are they really related somehow to the Knights Templar? You being a,” he hesitated a bit, running his PC-meter in his head, “well, pretty much a monk. That makes them have something in common with you, right?” Sam kicked his feet about awkwardly. “Look, trying to formulate a question here is making me sound like a child with no goddamn vocabulary.”
Father Harper glanced at Sam in reprimand.
“What?” Sam asked.
“The blasphemy, Sam,” he reminded the journalist.
“That is another thing,” Sam related his vexation with a bit of a bite. “It’s only blasphemy to you and your flock, Father. I’m respecting your choice of belief by addressing you by your title. As an atheist, I think I’m giving your religion enough goddamn respect as it is.”
The big priest seemed to stare into Sam’s soul, making the journalist more than just a little uncomfortable. “I’m waiting,” Sam said, just to break the silence between them. “What retort will you whip me with next?”
“None,” Father Harper replied, folding his arms across his chest. “I was simply listening to you, Sam. Am I not supposed to look at you when you speak to me?”
“Oh,” Sam said almost inaudibly. “I am just so done with religion, Father. All the rules and threats, applying human emotion and traits to a god. Not only does it not make sense from a scientific, or even moral, point of view, but religious people live in such a bubble where their way is the right way, that they forget that it is but one point of view, one angle, in a million.”
“Like a fool being too foolish to know that he is a fool?” Father Harper asked casually.
“Aye!” Sam cried, delighted that the priest could summarize his tirade so perfectly. “How did you know that? How could a man who is squarely in the middle of the nonsensical be so perceptive of the division caused by his faith?”
“Nina told me that once,” he smiled bitterly, dropping his gaze to the ground, “and secondly,” he wavered slightly, allowing Sam to read his mind.
“You weren’t always a priest. I get it, Father, I do,” Sam nodded profusely, bringing a smile to the priest’s face.
Jan Harris came stumbling out with a travel bag in one hand and dragging a hard case on wheels with the other. The priest hastened to take her bag, but Sam casually sauntered after them, reserving his chivalry for women he liked.
On the way to the borough of Newham, the atmosphere was fraught with apprehension between them.
“Where exactly are we going in Scotland?” Jan Harris wanted to know as the taxi pulled away. “We are going to Sam’s place for him to get fresh clothes…?”
“And my gear,” Sam chipped in sternly, giving Harris a spiteful grimace.
“…and then we will take his car to Oban, to my cottage at the church,” Father Harper finished, giving Sam another one of those sharp looks he always did when the rugged journalist was being rude to someone.
Harris’ phone rang. Both men froze, exchanging glances. They both suspected correctly that Ayer was calling for an update from her, but in front of the driver, there was not much they could discuss. She looked at her companions, shrugging.
“You have to take this,” Sam insisted in the most normal tone he could. “It could be an extremely important call.”
“Not here,” she whispered. “It’s too noisy and I need privacy, as I am sure you can appreciate.”
“Take the fucking call, Harris,” Sam hissed.
His less than gentle urging arrested the attention of the driver, who pretended not to care, but still kept looking in the rear view mirror.
“Harris, if something happens to Nina because you did not comply…,” Sam warned.
“Okay, alright. Jesus!” she groaned. The priest stared at her, shaking his head. “Sorry, Father.” She answered the phone, but before she could say anything, she was told to shut up and listen. With Sam frantically gawking at her for some sort of windfall, she only nodded sporadically, looking worried. He turned to Father Harper. “Something’s wrong.”
“Don’t fret before you have reason, Sam,” the priest consoled under his breath.
“I know Harris. Nothing scares her. That face you see her making there?” he whispered harshly. “I have never seen that expression on that woman. She is scared of something. It had better not be because she has bad news to give me.”
“I will, yes,” she said, clutching the phone. Sam grabbed it from her. “Listen, Ayer, speak directly to me if you have to! Ayer! Fuck!”
“He is already gone, Sam!” Harris moaned, snatching her phone from his hands.
“What did he say?” Sam probed, but Father Harper motioned to him to wait until they were out of public earshot. It drove the journalist crazy to have to wait, but when they arrived at London City Airport, he could take no more. “Harris, I have to know,” he said as they exited the cab and retrieved her baggage from the boot.