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 PACIFIC
7o N, 155o 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 rises to a gentle chop as the wind begins to blow.
SEVENTEEN
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.”
“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 own 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.”
“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 chainlink 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 Saint 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—and that is already here. Then will come plague and famine and plague—listen to the news and you’ll know that a plague is crouched in the wings, waiting to spring—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...