The Heaven Trilogy (121 page)

He looked at the boards strapped together on the bridge. The wood appeared rotten—the hemp rope frayed. The whole contraption looked as though it might go into the water at any moment.

In fact, even as he looked a piece of wood split and sent a small fragment tumbling lazily to the river.

He watched it fall. He would have to watch his footing as he crossed. Then another board bucked, splitting to its pale core, as if an invisible ax had attacked the wood.

A chill flashed up Shannon’s spine. It all sprang to his mind in a brief instant: the fact that the wood wasn’t crumbling but being hit. By bullets!

He spun around.

The helicopter fired from a long distance—too far for accuracy—but it bore in quickly. The sound of its whirling blades was swallowed by the rapids, but Shannon couldn’t mistake the flashes erupting from its nose.

For a moment Shannon stood shocked by disbelief, unable to move. In that moment another board fell to pieces, two meters from his planted feet. Two options streamed through his mind: He could retreat to the forest or he could race forward, across the bridge.

With a sudden roar the gunship spun overhead, climbed sharply, and kicked its tail around. It was lining up for a second pass.

Shannon leapt to the bridge. He grabbed the rope and scrambled down the sagging span, but the sudden movement caused the bridge to lurch wildly under his feet. In a moment of panic he almost missed the rope entirely and then found it quickly. To his right the attacking craft lined up on the bridge for another pass.

Crossing had been the wrong choice—he knew it then, when the first bullets took a chunk from the board at his feet. He should have run back to the forest. Now he stood in the open, helpless, with a cannon playing the planks like invisible fingers on a keyboard.

He was going to die!

The thought immobilized him.

THE PILOT watched the boards disintegrate before the boy and he eased the stream of lead to the right, knowing now that he could hardly miss.

“Finish him!” Abdullah said beside him.

The pilot quickly refocused his fire. The young man suddenly jerked back as if a huge hand had slammed into his chest. A spray of red blood glistened through sunlight. They had him!

He flipped backward over the rope that supported the bridge and tumbled lazily through the air, his hands limp like a puppet’s. The fall alone would have been enough to kill a man, but neither of them could miss the gaping, bloody hole in the boy’s side.

Abdullah groaned and the pilot blinked at the sound.

And then, far below, the body splashed into the current and disappeared.

“Around,” Abdullah ordered. Sweat poured from his face. His black hair with its distinctive white wedge lay plastered against his skull. “Around. We have to be certain.”

The pilot guided the helicopter around to look for the boy. But the pilot knew he was wasting his time.

The boy was dead.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Eight Years Later
Monday

“GOOD MORNING, BILL.”

“Good morning, Helen. You sound good.”

“I have news.”

That made the pastor pause. “What kind of news?”

“It’s starting,” Helen said. She paused. “Evil is thick in the air and it’s about to take this country by storm.”

“I’m pretty sure those were your exact words eight years ago.”

“I told you then and I’ve told you a hundred times since that the death of Tanya’s parents was only the beginning.”

“Yes, Helen, you did tell me. And I’ve prayed with you. For eight years. That’s a long time.”

“Eight years is nothing. God’s playing his pieces in this chess match and really I think it began fifty years ago. They’ve been moving and countermoving for decades up there on this one.”

“A chess match? I hardly think we’re pawns in some game.”

“Not a game, Bill. A match. The same match cast over each of our hearts. And you’re right—we’re not simply pawns. We have a mind of our own, but that doesn’t mean God isn’t telling us to move two spaces to the right or one space forward. Actually, it’s more like a whisper to our hearts, but it’s the thunder of heaven. It’s up to us whether we will listen to that thunder, but make no mistake, he moves the match. In this case, the match started way back. And one of the moves was for Tanya’s parents to go as missionaries to Venezuela. To bring truth to the Indians, yes, but perhaps even more, to bring Tanya there, so that she could become who she is.”

“You honestly believe that Tanya’s parents were called to the jungle, left their church with great hopes and prayers, struck off for Venezuela, lived among the Indians for ten years, and then were murdered for the effect it would have on their daughter? Who, incidentally, is not looking like a great prophet or any such thing these days.”

“Yes, Bill. I do think that was one of the primary purposes in all of this. Yes, that is how God works. A missionary is called to Indonesia perhaps as much for a young boy they talk to in the airport in New York on their way out of the country, than for all the people they preach to in the next twenty years in the foreign land. Perhaps that boy is a Billy Graham or a Bill Bright. God is quite brilliant, don’t you think?”

Her pastor was silent on the phone.

“But Tanya’s time is coming, Bill. You will see. It’s coming soon.”

TANYA VANDERVAN sat flatfooted in the wooden chair, aware that her palms were sweating despite the cool air spilling from the vents mounted above. She shifted her gaze to the room’s single window overlooking Denver’s skyline from ten stories up, thinking that even here, within the whitewashed walls of Denver Memorial, she hadn’t managed to escape the jungle. Eight years earlier she had fled a heavy jumble of green, only to be led into a tangled web of confusion in her own mind. And now she had found another jungle— these concrete structures outside her window, built up around her like a prison.

Thank God for Helen.

She moved her eyes back to the older men sitting like a panel of judges behind the long table. The medical review board of Denver Memorial Hospital consisted of these three dressed in white smocks. They knew her as Sherry. Sherry Blake. Dr. Sherry Blake, six months and counting in the hospital’s intern program.

And by their frowns, six months too long, and counting far too slow. Most in the medical profession had emerged out of the stuffiness that had characterized hospitals in the seventies—these men had somehow missed the boat.

Sherry crossed her legs and nervously ran a hand behind her neck. Her hair fell in soft curls to her shoulders now—no longer blond, but brown. It swept across her forehead, above eyes no longer blue but darkened to a hazel color. The idea had been her own, five or six years ago, based on the notion that if she changed her name and her appearance, maybe then, with a new identity, she could escape her mental turmoil. Maybe then she could escape haunting memories of Shannon. The psychobabble quacks had tried to discourage her, but she’d lost confidence in them long before.

The idea had grown on her, until she’d become obsessed with altering her identity. She legally changed her name, dyed her hair, and wore hazel contact lenses. The change was so dramatic that even Helen had hardly recognized her. Comparing her high-school graduation picture to her new image in the mirror, even Tanya—Sherry—could barely see the similarities.

“What I think Dr. Park is suggesting, Miss Blake, is that there’s a certain behavior becoming of doctors and other behavior that doesn’t fit the image very well.” Ottis Piper removed his eyes from her and peered through his glasses to the paper before him. “At least the image Denver Memorial considers acceptable. Boots and T-shirts are not part of that image.”

Sherry raised an eyebrow, teetering precariously on the fence between total submission to these in white coats and bull-frank honesty.

She knew submission would bode well for her career.
Suck it up, baby. Swallow all their nasty foolishness with a yawning gullet. Tell them what they want to hear and get on with your life.

Whatever’s left of it.

Bull-frank honesty, on the other hand, might give momentary satisfaction but would most probably leave her wishing she had swallowed their nonsense after all. Unfortunately, the chill now washing over her head seemed to have frozen her mouth, and no matter how desperately part of her wanted to apologize, she could not.

“Oh? Are you dissatisfied with my work, Dr. Piper? Or is it just this image thing that has you in stitches?”

That set the gray-haired British import back a few inches. His eyes expanded. “I’m not sure you understand the nature of this review, Miss Blake. We’re here to discuss
your
behavior, not ours.” His accent bit off each word precisely and Sherry found herself wanting to reach out and shove something into that mouth. A sock, maybe.

Her mind was urgently suggesting she retract herself from this insane course. After all, interns sucked up. It was a skill learned in med school. Suck-up 101.

“I apologize, Mr. Piper. I spoke too soon.” She attempted a polite smile, wondering if it looked more like a snarl. “I will pay more attention to the way I dress, although in my defense, I’ve worn boots and T-shirts only once, last week, on my day off. I came to visit a patient who needed a hand to hold.”

Director Moreland watched like an eagle from his side perch, not unfriendly necessarily, but not friendly either. Park, the last of the trio, spoke. “Just watch your dress, Miss Blake. We run a professional institution here, not a recreational park.”

“Professional? Or militant? Dress isn’t an issue in most hospitals anymore. Maybe you should get out a bit more.”

Piper peered over the bifocals he’d mounted on his nose and cleared his throat. “It seems we have a matter of slightly greater importance to discuss. In the past two weeks you’ve fallen asleep three times while on duty. One of those times you missed a patient call.” He paused.

“Yes,” Sherry said, “I’m sorry about that.”

“Oh, I don’t think it’s as simple as sleep, Miss Blake. I think it has more to do with the
lack
of sleep.” Sherry’s fingers felt suddenly cool, drained of blood. Where was the Brit headed with this?

“You see, lack of sleep is a problem with our profession. Tired doctors make mistakes. Sometimes big ones—the kind of mistakes that kill people. And we don’t want to kill people, do we now?”

“What happens to me out of this place is none of your business,” she said.

“Oh? You’re denying you have a problem, Miss Blake?” Piper queried smugly.

She swallowed. “We all have trouble sleeping now and then.”

“I’m not speaking of now and then. I’m speaking of every night, my lady.”

“I’m not
your lady
, Piper. Where did you hear about this?”

“Just answer the question.”

“I don’t think it’s any of your business whether or not I have trouble sleeping. What I do in my home is my problem, not yours.”

“Oh? I see. So if you come to work sloshed, we should just turn an eye as well?”

“I’m not coming to work sloshed, am I? I intend on finishing my internship with full honors. Someday people like you will report to people like me.”

“You are out of line!” Piper whispered harshly. “Answer my questions! Isn’t it true, Miss Blake, that you depend on medication to keep you awake at work? For all practical purposes, you’re a drug addict!”

Sherry sat speechless, trembling behind her calm facade.

“Is this true, Sherry?” the director asked from her left.

She looked past him, through the window. A horn blared in the parking lot—some patient on edge. “I’m not a drug addict. And I resent the suggestion. I’ve had my problems with insomnia,” she said, swallowing again. For a moment she thought her eyes might water. That would be a disaster.

“But it hasn’t kept me from getting this far,” she said evenly.

“How long have you had this condition?”

“A while. A few years. About eight, I suppose.”

“Eight years?” Park spoke again.

“How bad are the episodes?” Moreland asked.

“By what standards?”

“By any standard. How much sleep did you get last night?”

She blinked, thinking back to the restless night. An easy night, all things considering. But they wouldn’t think so.

“Two hours.”

“And the night before?”

“Maybe two.”

He paused. “And that’s normal?”

She shifted her eyes to him now. “Yes, I guess it’s fairly normal.”

“For seven years of medical school you’ve averaged two hours of sleep a night?”

She nodded. “Pretty much.”

“How?”

“A lot of coffee . . . And medication when it becomes unbearable.”

“So how did all this begin?” Moreland asked.

His sympathy would be her only hope now, she thought. But she’d never done sympathy well. The realization that she was lowering herself into those waters with these sharks made her swallow.

On the other hand her boat was about to capsize anyway.

“When I was seventeen, my parents were killed,” she said, looking back out the window. “They were missionaries in Venezuela, among the Yanamamo. Guerrillas wiped out the mission and a plantation nearby. I was the only one who survived. They killed my mother, my father, a good friend, and his parents.” She cleared her throat.

“I spent a few days locked in an underground box without realizing that it opened to a tunnel that I managed to escape through. I think I may have slept through two or three nights since.” She shrugged and looked at Moreland. “The memories keep me awake. Posttraumatic stress disorder.”

“I’m sorry,” Moreland said. “Have you had any progress?”

“For short periods, yes. But never without relapse.” Memories of therapy drifted through her mind—hundreds of hours of the stuff. Each hour spent carefully retracing her past, searching for that switch they hoped would turn all this off. They had managed to pull the shades a time or two, but never a switch.