Left Behind: A Novel Of Earth's Last Days (14 page)

The guilt and nearly spoiling his image straightened him up and made him cut down on his drinking. Seeing Raymie born sobered him even more. It was time to grow up and take as much responsibility as a husband and father as he did as a pilot.

But now, as Rayford ran all those memories through his throbbing head, he felt the deepest regret and remorse a man can feel. He felt like a failure. He was so unworthy of Irene. Somehow he knew now, though he had never allowed himself to consider it before, that she couldn’t in any way have been as naive or stupid had hoped and imagined. She had to have known how vapid he was, how shallow, and yes, cheap. And yet she had stayed by him, loved him, fought to keep the marriage together.

He couldn’t argue that she became a different person after she switched churches and got serious about her faith. She preached at him at first, sure. She was excited and wanted him to discover what she had found. He ran. Eventually she either gave up or resigned herself to the fact that he was not going to come around by her pleading or cajoling. Now he knew from seeing her list that she had never given up. She had simply taken to praying for him.

No wonder Rayford had never gotten that close to ultimately defiling his marriage with Hattie Durham. Hattie! How ashamed he was of that silly pursuit! For all he knew, Hattie was innocent. She had never bad-mouthed his wife or the fact that he was married. She had never suggested anything inappropriate, at least for her age. Young people were more touchy and flirtatious, and she claimed no moral or religious code. That Rayford had obsessed over the possibilities with Hattie, while she probably hardly knew it, made him feel all the more foolish.

Where was this guilt coming from? He had locked eyes with Hattie numerous times, and they had spent hours alone together over dinners in various cities. But she had never asked him to her room or tried to kiss him or even hold his hand. Maybe she would have responded had he been the aggressor, but maybe not. She might just as easily have been offended, insulted, disappointed.

Rayford shook his head. Not only was he guilty of lusting after a woman to whom he had no right, but he was still such a klutz he hadn’t even known how to pursue her.

And now he faced the darkest hours of his soul. He was nervous about Chloe. He wanted her home and safe in the worst way, hoping that having his own flesh and blood in the house would somehow assuage his grief and pain. He knew he should be hungry again, but nothing appealed. Even the fragrant and tasty cookies he thought he would have to ration had become painful reminders of Irene. Maybe tomorrow.

Rayford switched on the television, not out of interest in seeing more mayhem, but with the hope of some news of order, traffic clearing, people connecting. After a minute or two of the same old same old, he turned it off again. He rejected the idea of calling O’Hare about the likelihood of getting in to get his car, because he didn’t want to tie up the phone for even a minute in case Chloe was trying to get through. It had been hours since he’d heard she left Palo Alto. How long would it take to make all those crazy connections and finally get on an Ozark flight from Springfield to the Chicago area? He remembered the oldest joke in the airline industry: Ozark spelled backward is Krazo. Only it didn’t amuse him just then.

He leaped when the phone rang, but it was not Chloe.

“I’m sorry, Captain,” Hattie said. “I promised to call you back, but I fell asleep after the call I took and have been out ever since.”

“That’s quite all right, Hattie. In fact, I need to—”

“I mean, I didn’t want to bother you anyway at a time like this.”

“No, that’s OK, I just—”

“Have you talked to Chloe?”

“I’m waiting for her to call right now, so I really have to get off!”

Rayford had been more curt than he intended and Hattie was, at first, silent.

“Well, all right then. I’m sorry.”

“I’ll call you, Hattie. OK?”

“OK.”

She had sounded hurt. He was sorry about that, but not sorry that he had gotten rid of her for the time being. He knew she was only trying to help and be kind, but she hadn’t been listening. She was alone and afraid just like he was, and no doubt by now she had found out about her family. Oh, no! He hadn’t even asked about them! She would hate him, and why shouldn’t she? How selfish could I be? he wondered.

Eager as he was to hear from Chloe, he had to risk a couple more minutes on the phone. He dialed Hattie, but her line was busy.

Buck tried calling Dirk Burton in London as soon as he got home, not wanting to wait longer with the time difference overseas. He got a puzzling response. Dirk’s personal answering machine ran through its usual message, but as soon as the leave-a-message beep sounded, a longer tone indicated that the tape was full. Strange. Dirk was either sleeping through it all or Buck had not considered that Dirk could have disappeared. Besides leaving Buck with a million questions about Stonagal, Carpathia, Todd-Cothran, and the whole phenomenon, Dirk was one of his best friends from Princeton. Ob, please let this be a coincidence, he thought. Let him be traveling.

As soon as Buck hung up, his phone rang. Of all people, it was Hattie Durham. She was crying. “I’m sorry to bother you, Mr. Williams, and I had promised myself I would never use your home number—”

“That’s all right, Hattie. What is it?”

“Well, it’s silly really, but I just went through something, and I don’t have anybody to talk to about it. I couldn’t get through to my mother and sisters, and well, I just thought maybe you’d understand.”

“Try me.”

She told Buck about her call to Captain Steele and brought him up to date on who Steele was, that he had lost his wife and son, and that she had been late calling him back after hearing her good news from Buck. “And then he just brushed me off because he’s waiting for a call from his daughter.”

“I can understand that,” Buck tried, rolling his eyes. How did he get into this lonely hearts club? Didn’t she have any girlfriends to unload on?

“I can, too,” she said. “That’s just it. And I know he’s grieving because it’s like his wife and son are dead, but he knew I was on pins and needles about my family, and he never even asked.”

“Well, I’m sure it is all just part of the tension of the moment, the grief, like you say, and—”

“Oh, I know it. I just wanted to talk to somebody, and I thought of you.”

“Well, hey, anytime,” Buck lied. Oh, boy, he thought. My home number is definitely going to come off that next batch of business cards. “Listen, I’d better let you go. I’ve got an evening meeting tonight myself, and—”

“Well, thanks for listening.”

“I understand,” he said, though he doubted he ever would. Maybe Hattie showed more depth and sense when she wasn’t under stress. He hoped so.

Rayford was glad Hattie’s line was busy, because he could tell her he had tried to call her right back, but he didn’t have to tie up his phone any longer. A minute later, his phone rang again.

“Captain, it’s me again. I’m sorry, I won’t keep you long, but I thought you might have tried to call me, and I’ve been on the phone, so—”

“As a matter of fact, I did, Hattie. What have you found out about your family?”

“They’re fine.” She was crying.

“Oh, thank God,” he said.

Rayford wondered what had gotten into him. He said he was happy for her, but he had come to the conclusion that those who had not disappeared had missed out on the greatest event of cosmic history. But what was he supposed to say—”Oh, I’m sorry your family was, too”?

When he hung up, Rayford sat next to the phone with a nagging feeling that he had for sure missed Chloe’s call this time. It made him mad. His stomach was growling and he knew he should eat, but he had decided he would hold off as long as possible, hoping to eat with Chloe when she arrived. Knowing her, she wouldn’t have eaten a thing.

BUCK’S
subconscious waking system failed him that evening, but by 8:45 Pm. he was back in Steve Plank’s office, disheveled and apologetic. And he had been right. He felt the resentment from veteran department editors. Juan Ortiz, chief of the international politics section, was incensed that Buck should have anything to do with the summit conference Juan planned to cover in two weeks.

“The Jewish Nationalists are discussing an issue I have been following for years. Who would have believed they would consider warming to one world government? That they would even entertain the discussion is monumental. They’re meeting here, rather than in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv, because their idea is so revolutionary. Most Israeli Nationalists think the Holy Land has gone too far with its bounty already. This is historic.”

“Then what’s your problem,” Plank said, “with my adding our top guy to the coverage?”

“Because I am your top guy on this.”

“I’m trying to make sense of all these meetings,” Plank said.

Jimmy Borland, the religion editor, weighed in. “I understand Juan’s objections, but I’ve got two meetings at the same time. I welcome the help.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Plank said.

“But I’ll be frank, Buck,” Borland added. “I want a say in the final piece.”

“Of course,” Plank said.

“Not so fast,” Buck said. “I don’t want to be treated like a pool reporter here. I’m going to have my own take on these meetings, and I’m not trying to horn in on your expert territories. I wouldn’t want to do the coverages of the individual meetings themselves. I want to bring some coordination, find the meaning, the common denominators. Jimmy, your two groups—the religious Jews who want to rebuild the temple and the ecumenicalists who want some sort of one-world religious order—are they going to be at odds with each other? Will there be religious Jews—”

“Orthodox.”

“OK, Orthodox Jews at the ecumenical meeting? Because that seems at cross purposes with rebuilding the temple.”

“Well, at least you’re thinking like a religion editor,” Jimmy said. “That’s encouraging.”

“But what’s your thought?”

“I don’t know. That’s what makes this so interesting. That they should meet at the same time in the same city is too good to be true.”

Financial editor Barbara Donahue brought closure to the discussion. “I’ve dealt with you before on these kinds of efforts, Steve,” she said. “And I appreciate the way you let everybody vent without threat. But we all know your mind is made up about Buck’s involvement, so let’s lick our wounds and get on with it. If we each get to put our own spin on the coverage in our departments and have some input on the overall piece that I assume goes in the main well, let’s get on with it.”

Even Ortiz nodded, though to Buck he seemed reluctant.

“Buck’s the quarterback,” Plank said, “so keep in touch with him. He’ll report to me. You want to say anything, Buck?”

“Just thanks a lot,” he said ruefully, causing everyone to chuckle. “Barbara, your monetarists are meeting right at the U.N., like they did when they went to the three currency thing?”

She nodded. “Same place and pretty much the same people.”

“How involved is Jonathan Stonagal?”

“Overtly, you mean?” she said.

“Well, everybody knows he’s circumspect. But is there a Stonagal influence?”

“Does a duck have lips?”

Buck smiled and jotted a note. “I’ll take that as a yes. I’d like to hang around that one, maybe try to get to Diamond John.”

“Good luck. He probably won’t show his face.”

“But he’ll be in town, won’t he, Barbara? Wasn’t he at the Plaza for the duration last time?”

“You do get around, don’t you?” she said.

“Well, he only had each of the principals up to his suite every day.”

Juan Ortiz raised a hand. “I’m going along with this, and I have nothing personal against you, Buck. But I don’t believe there is a way to coordinate this story without inventing some tie-in. I mean, if you want to lead off a feature story by saying there were four important international meetings in town almost all at once, fine. But to make them interrelated would be stretching.”

“If I find that they aren’t interrelated, there won’t be an overall story,” Buck said. “Fair enough?”

Rayford Steele was nearly beside himself with worry, compounded by his grief. Where was Chloe? He had been inside all day, pacing, mourning, thinking. He felt stale and claustrophobic. He had called Pan-Continental and was told his car might be released by the time he got back from his weekend flight. The news on TV showed the amazing progress being made at clearing the roadways and getting mass transportation rolling again. But the landscape would appear tacky for months. Cranes and wreckers had run out of junkyards, so the twisted wreckages remained in hazardous piles at the sides of roads and expressways.

By the time Rayford got around to calling his wife’s church, it was after hours, and he was grateful he wouldn’t have to talk to anyone. As he hoped, a new message was on their answering machine, though it was communicated by a stunned-sounding male voice.

“You have reached New Hope Village Church. We are planning a weekly Bible study, but for the time being we will meet just once each Sunday at 10 A.M. While our entire staff, except me, and most of our congregation are gone, the few of us left are maintaining the building and distributing a videotape our senior pastor prepared for a time such as this. You may come by the church office anytime to pick up a free copy, and we look forward to seeing you Sunday morning.”

Well, of course, Rayford thought, that pastor had often spoken of the Rapture of the church. That was why Irene was so enamored with it. What a creative idea, to tape a message for those who had been! He and Chloe would have to get one the next day. He hoped she would be as interested as he was in discovering the truth.

Rayford gazed out the front window in the darkness, just in time to see Chloe, one big suitcase on the ground next to her, paying a cabdriver. He ran from the house in his stocking feet and gathered her into his arms. “Oh, Daddy!” she wailed. “How’s everybody?”

He shook his head.

“I don’t want to hear this,” she said, pulling away from him and looking to the house as if expecting her mother or brother to appear in the doorway.