11

Day 4

JASON AND LEIAH CRUISED DOWN THE FREEWAY in somber silence at eleven the following morning. The Greek’s black Mercedes led them ten meters ahead, speeding Caleb to the park as Donna had suggested. It felt like a funeral procession. Jason’s request that the boy do nothing without them present had paid off; at least for that they could be thankful.

They had arrived at the Orthodox church an hour earlier, eager to see the boy, only to discover that the Father had expanded his restrictions. Not only was their visitation limited to the one-o’clock hour each day, they could only see him in the main room, and only away from the windows. The boy was to remain isolated from any contact with the outside world, and that included watching the other children in the play yard.

Leiah had expressed her outrage in true form. It was child abuse!

But Nikolous had merely chuckled. “He’s been confined to the walls of a monastery for ten years, and now you decide it’s better for him to wander the streets of Los Angeles? We’re simply keeping him in an environment more familiar to him. I don’t think Dr. Caldwell would disagree.”

The circumstances allowed them only twenty minutes with the boy and that with Martha standing guard like an overstuffed black crow. The boy walked from the dark hallway dressed like a proper parochial schoolboy. Leiah kneeled to hug him and then the boy walked to Jason and lifted his arms for an embrace. A huge grin split his face when he pulled away. But he still hardly spoke. A simple yes with wide eyes, or a no. Are you happy, Caleb? Yes. Do you need anything? No. Leiah kept eyeing the hallway with a furrowed brow. Are the quarters okay? Yes.

Nikolous had taken his decision to isolate Caleb to the extreme. He could drive in no car other than the Mercedes, which had been appropriately prepared. Martha had marched the boy to the waiting car, hustled him into the back seat, and attempted to shut the door before Jason could stop her. But he’d grabbed the door and moved her aside with a stern stare. Inside, the windows had been blackened, and a burgundy velvet sheet closed off the front seat so that the rear was completely sealed off from any outside view. Caleb sat with his hands between his knees, lost on the large seat.

“We’ll be right behind you in my car,” Jason promised him. Then Martha had rattled something off in Greek and angrily slammed the door, very nearly on his fingers. She was wicked, that one, and he shuddered to think that she had any influence on the boy at all.

They turned off the freeway and entered heavy surface traffic. “I still can’t believe we’re running off to some park because some snotty reporter decided it would be the best thing for him,” Leiah said with a frown.

“Nikolous agreed to it, not me,” Jason returned.

“I didn’t hear your objections. And I can certainly think of more courageous ways to reignite an old flame than at the expense of a young boy.”

“Please. This isn’t about reigniting old flames.”

“Of course not.”

They came to a stoplight and pulled up to the Mercedes’ bumper. Jason held his tongue and wished for a change in subject. He got one.

“Do you think he’s happy?” Leiah asked.

“I’m not sure he knows how not to be happy,” Jason said.

She bit the fingernail on her index finger and stared ahead. “This isn’t right, Jason. We have to get him back. We can’t just sit by and let them destroy him.”

“And how do you propose we get him back? By gunpoint?”

“Of course not. But there must be legal remedies. Surely there are laws for the protection of children in this country.”

“He’s a refugee. You heard Nikolous; he’ll simply say he’s keeping Caleb’s customs.”

“You can’t talk to John Gardner at World Relief and explain?”

“I already have. But there’s no evidence of abuse, is there? Honestly, Nikolous has everything on his side. We don’t even have cause to file a petition for a new hearing.”

“So we do what?”

“So we stay with him and jump all over Nikolous at the first sign of impropriety.”

“He deserves more, you know.”

She was right. He deserved a loving mother, and Jason wondered if Leiah had decided to contend for the spot. And what would Jason’s own life be like if his ex, Ailsa, had possessed Leiah’s loyalty? What if his Stephen had had a mother like Leiah?

Of course that was ridiculous. He hardly even knew Leiah.

Jason glanced at her. She’d left her motel and taken an apartment on a weekly rent, not far from his house. She would stay for the boy until satisfied that he was in good hands. Like the Peace Corps, the Red Cross would pay her a small monthly salary to cover her expenses for up to a three-month break between assignments.

Her scars were well concealed under a white blouse today. At a glance you wouldn’t know that she even had the scars, but look closely at the edges and the disfigurement took shape. And if you were to look past a button, you would find what?

She looked at him and they held stares for a brief moment. The light turned and Jason pulled after the Mercedes.

The next question came from him without his full blessing, but there it was. “So what happened to your neck?” Actually it wasn’t her neck. It was her body, but he couldn’t very well ask what happened to her body. Still it wasn’t her neck, was it? “I mean what—”

“I know what you mean. You mean why is my body covered in burn scars? Don’t worry; it won’t bite.”

“Actually, it’s hardly noticeable.” His face heated with a blush. “You’re really quite beautiful.”

Goodness, what was he saying?

“You don’t have to patronize me.”

“I’m not patronizing you. You seem to be concerned about your skin; I’m simply telling you that you’re a beautiful woman, with or without the scars. You really should learn to take a compliment.”

That quieted her. It was true, of course. One look in the mirror and she must know that most women would kill to have a face as striking as hers. Then again, one look in the mirror with her blouse off might have them blanching. It was an image Jason had difficulty framing.

“I’m sorry.” She was staring ahead now. “Everybody has some beauty, you know. Their hands, their hair, their legs. For me it’s my face. But the rest of my body is a wrinkled mess of pitted flesh. Either way it’s me, take it or leave it.”

Jason had no clue how to respond.

She sighed. “I was in a car accident in Ottawa when I was twenty years old. I was on the national track team, headed for the Olympics in Korea— two and four hundred meter. I think I might have medaled too. The car caught fire and I couldn’t get out. Fortunately the window was down enough to get my head out or I would’ve died from the smoke. When they dragged me from the car, my skin was gone. It took twenty-two separate surgeries to get me to where I am now.”

She turned to stare out her window. “I tried to return to normal life and gave up after coming to the conclusion that North America is not well suited for people covered from head to toe in disfiguring scars. I volunteered for the Red Cross, found Africa, and vowed never to return to Canada.”

A shiver passed through Jason’s bones, thinking of the flames licking at her skin. He swallowed. “And now you’ve returned.”

“Yes.”

“Not many would do what you’re doing.”

“Not many have seen what I’ve seen in the Third World.”

Jason nodded. True enough. She wasn’t confined to a wheelchair. Although in many ways the grotesque lumps under her blouse confined her in their own world. She knew that well enough.

“So what do you make of the boy now that you’ve seen what he can do?” he asked.

“I think he’s the same boy who fled the monastery with us a week ago. Even beyond this power of his there’s something special.”

Jason nodded. “He’s nearly irresistible, isn’t he? A perfect package of goodness. I can’t get over his eyes.”

Leiah turned to him and smiled. “He has a way of stealing your heart, doesn’t he?”

Jason nodded. “I had a son once. Stephen. He died from ALS—Lou Gehrig’s disease—when he was four. If he had lived, he’d be about Caleb’s age.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Jason cleared his throat. “Funny thing is we took him to faith healers, you know. We were desperate and turned to the church. It was all nonsense, of course. Scared him half to death, all those fools yelling their prayers over him. But it also raised his hopes and that was the worst of it. They even had me going for a few months.”

“I can’t imagine. Someone once suggested I find someone to pray for me. I don’t think I ever could. I’ve learned to accept myself; wanting to be someone else again could ruin me.”

“Caleb makes you think, though.”

“Yes, he does that, doesn’t he?”

“It’s amazing. Not so long ago the world was flat. Until we discovered that it was round. So now what are we discovering through Caleb? That the human mind is far more powerful than once imagined.”

They’d come to the park and Jason piloted the Bronco through its arching entrance. Cars lined the street; pedestrians loitered on the grass; ahead a crowd gathered around a commotion Jason assumed would be the press conference.

“You were married?” Leiah asked.

“Yes.”

“And what became of your wife?”

“Ailsa? She left me a month after Stephen died. Ran off with someone who managed to distract her from her hell.”

“And you, too, found Africa.”

“Yes. I guess I did.”

He glanced at her and saw that her eyes were on him, blue and soft. He smiled and they drove on in silence.

They followed Nikolous into a side parking lot with reserved space beside a white news van sporting the NBC peacock.

“I thought this was supposed to be a quiet, comfortable setting for him,” Leiah said, looking at the crowd already gathered. “What time is that press conference supposed to start?”

“She said twelve and it’s eleven-thirty now.”

Leiah humphed and hurried out. She reached Caleb’s door before the Greek had climbed out and she quickly took the boy under her wing. They approached the crowd from the rear, looking for Donna. Nikolous strutted forward in his tailored black suit with the three of them in tow as if their allegiance to him was without question. And he wasn’t so wrong—although they could have bolted at any time, it would be a futile run from the law.

Where was Donna? This news conference of hers looked as if it was about to start.

Caleb walked along in his typical posture, gliding on his feet, hardly moving his upper torso or his arms. His belt looked cinched too tight, but only because the new shorts he wore were several sizes too large.

The boy looked at the crowd in a dumb silence, and it occurred to Jason that this was the first time he’d been in public since their first visit to the Orthodox church. Since then he’d spent every waking minute in his new prison. There was the visit to UCLA, but he’d met no one except the doctor there. And prior to the first church meeting, he’d seen nothing that could not be seen from the window of a speeding car—either a taxi or his Bronco. Watching him, Jason wondered how much of Dr. Caldwell’s prognosis would bear true.

They skirted the crowd toward the front. For the most part this was a news crowd, maybe a hundred strong with all of their support staff. The candidate’s people had erected a podium on a small platform. Behind it a huge vinyl backdrop showed a vivid red sunset. A life-size man and woman had been imprinted on the sunset, standing side by side, each staring intensely at their own knotted fists raised to the sky, as if in those hands lay some deep mysterious secret. Crandal’s slogan, presumably that secret, was splashed in a bright blue across their waists: Power to the People. The setup looked more like something you’d find at a revolution rally in Russia than at a candidate’s news conference.

A very large man with a perfectly bald head strode out to the podium, and applause pattered across the lawn. Charles Crandal’s face split to a wide grin, and he immediately became a man who looked pleased with his surroundings. He carried himself lightly, despite his enormous size, and he wore his suit as if he’d been born in the thing. Crandal put both hands on the podium without acknowledging the accolades cast his way from supporters encroaching on the perimeter of the news groups. He scanned the crowd carefully, nodded slowly—as if he approved of this particular group, but just barely—and started to speak.

“Thank you. Thank you for your interest. Thank you for coming.” So this was the man Donna suggested might very well be the next president.

A young man wearing a headset had found Nikolous and now led them quickly to the right of the pack, where Donna stood directing a cameraman.

She looked up apologetically. “I’m sorry, but they moved the press conference up and it started even earlier. If you don’t mind, we can shoot him after. It shouldn’t be long.”

Nikolous frowned and gazed around. He nodded once.

Donna caught Jason’s eye and winked. Aware of Leiah beside him he smiled but just barely.

Donna returned her attention to the stage, where Crandal was making an adamant statement about some budget proposal he assured them would revolutionize American politics.

“It’s a plan the American people have deserved for a century but haven’t gathered the stomach to insist upon. Until now, that is. Now they insist, and so must I, ladies and gentlemen.” The man’s jowls shook when he spoke, but not enough to distract from the force of his words. His voice was low and it crackled, drawing Jason in with the first few syllables. A silence had settled over the gathering, and the words engaged their attention like a bullwhip over the heads of sluggard oxen.

“Mediocrity has taken the teeth out of our lives. Make no mistake about it, I will beg the people to demand their power back, and I will give the people what they demand.”

He delivered his diatribe with precision, like a laser beam that dispensed with the mind and went straight for the spine. His eyes cut across the crowd, deep-set and knowing. They settled on Jason for a moment, and when they moved on, he felt oddly relieved. An uncanny power possessed this man. Politics had never interested Jason much, but standing eight feet from the stage now, listening to this large man demanding their allegiance, he couldn’t help wanting to give it. It was more than good sense that flowed from him; it was a raw brilliance that insisted on being honored, if not revered.

A tall man with eyes as black as coal stood in a blue pinstripe suit in front of the stage to Crandal’s left, his legs spread and his arms gripped behind his back. He was the kind you might expect from the Mafia—a hatchet man who was clearly more interested in security than kissing the hands of old ladies.

The reporters scribbled notes and listened with rapt attention, and when Crandal ended his three-minute speech, they blurted their questions almost as one. Crandal let them ask, ignoring them as if he hadn’t heard them at all. He turned to face the NBC camera and invited Donna with an open palm. “I’ll start with you, Donna.”

Donna asked her question, but Jason hardly heard it. He watched her staring at Crandal—the way she carried herself, the movement of her jaw— and it occurred to him that she spoke with an authority that nearly matched Crandal’s. He was witness to the making of power. This was how it was done in the greatest of nations. This was how a person rose to command the largest and most powerful army in the world: by engaging a brilliant young reporter with smiling eyes and capturing her heart. Not in a romantic sense, of course, but in a way perhaps far more compelling.

“Well then, we’ll just have to see if the people can remember what it means to be American, won’t we, Donna?” Crandal said. A few chuckles rippled through the crowd.

“And if you wouldn’t mind, sir, what exactly does it mean to be American?” Donna redirected.

Crandal’s smile faded and he spoke as if lecturing. “It means we demand freedom. It means we will die for that freedom if need be. And in the event some of you might have misplaced your memory, freedom is a state of existence unrestrained by slavery, regardless of the master, whether he be armed with a hammer and a sickle or a document called the law.” He let the comment sink in and then removed his eyes from her. A dozen questions filled the air.

Yes indeed, the making of power.

Jason remembered the boy and he glanced to his right. The Greek was fixated on the stage, big nose matched by a jutting chin. Leiah stood watching the exchange between Crandal and another reporter. She caught Jason’s eye and smiled. The boy was by her side, his hand in hers. He stood stiff like a board and his eyes were glued to the candidate. Yes, of course, Caleb was why they had come in the first place. He looked like an awe-struck child gazing in at a circus for the first time.

For ten minutes Crandal handled the media’s questions as if he were in a jousting match and he the repeated victor. The media seemed to sense it too. They knew they were watching a man of destiny, and their eyes were bright with the knowledge.

“And how would you characterize the current administration’s proposal to trim the fifth fleet?” a question came.

“I would say that Murdock should spend more time trimming his waistline and less time tinkering with toys he knows nothing about,” the former director of the National Security Agency responded. Now there, only a man who had them on their knees already could get away with a statement like that. Any other political pundit would be beheaded by the press for the comment.

“How do you respond to critics who say your experience with the NSA casts shadows on your political integrity?”

“I suggest they go for a long walk and study our beautiful skies. If they happen to see a MiG screaming out of the sky, releasing a string of nuclear weapons, then I would tell them to vote for the opposition. But if by chance they find the skies clear, then I would invite them to vote for the man who granted them this gift.” They chuckled.

The event felt more like a stage show that topped the best Hollywood could offer than a political rally. According to Donna, the show was scheduled to last thirty minutes today.

But the boy changed that.

It came in a moment of unusual silence that Caleb’s soft voice spoke to Jason’s right. “He is the Tempest.”

Jason raised his brow. The words were barely loud enough for Jason to hear, much less Crandal, but the man’s eyes flickered and blinked three or four times very rapidly. He turned his head and stared at the NBC camera as if lost for the moment. Then his eyes searched each of their faces. Caleb stood wooden, unblinking, placid, except for the trembling in his fingers.

“This man will bring a new tempest to the earth.”

Several reporters, oblivious to the small distraction, resumed their questioning, but Jason doubted Crandal even heard them. His eyes were on the boy now, deadlocked and unwavering. Caleb soaked in his stare without flinching.

Donna looked quickly between the statesman and the boy; she had seen that connection too.

Crandal broke his gaze and faced the crowd. “Well, ladies and gentlemen . . .” He paused, at a loss for words, Jason thought. But he quickly recovered. “All good things must come to an end. Your understanding of the issues we face in this election has once again been stunning for a mob of journalists. For that I thank you. We’ll meet again, I am sure.”

With that he turned on his heels and strode from the platform. The tall man Jason had pegged as a Mafia type bolted around the stage, glanced back toward Caleb one last time, and was gone. Immediately the crowd began to disperse.

“What in God’s name was that?” Donna asked.

Leiah stared up at the empty stage. “You should ask? That was what you brought him here for.” She pulled the boy to her and turned to leave. “We don’t belong here,” she said and walked for the car with Caleb in hand.

Blane Roberts slid into the limousine next to Crandal, his mind churning incomprehensibly. The boy had said Tempest, hadn’t he? He had actually identified Crandal as the Tempest, which made no sense. Then again, any comment even associating Crandal with Tempest made perfect sense. If he was not Tempest, he had certainly created Tempest. And now a small half-breed had said so. Which was a problem. Not only because no one in this hemisphere could possibly know about Tempest, but because a small boy who seemed to be able to read minds had done so in public. The NBC reporter had heard, he thought.

Roberts closed the car door with a thump.

“I’m not even going to ask for an explanation,” Crandal said without turning. “But unless I’m missing something here, we’ve got a problem.”

“Yes sir, it seems that way. I’ll take care of it.”

“I’m sure you will.”

Encouraged by a red face, a bead of sweat snaked down the candidate’s temple. Crandal rarely yelled, at least not with his mouth. But he did wear his anger, and right now it clothed him like a king. His left hand held a tremor, and his jaw muscles tensed as if they were kneading bread. The rear of the limousine was insulated; the statesman could scream bloody murder without a single syllable being heard by even the driver. But for all practical purposes, he was screaming bloody murder and Roberts diverted his eyes.

“Give me a day or two—”

“And you’ll what? Kill the kid? Abduct him? Steal him from his sorry parents and slit his throat? Of course that’s what you’ll do because that’s what you do best, isn’t it, Roberts?”

Roberts blinked. “He’s a problem. I’ll take care of him.”

“Do it quickly.”

The large man put a finger under his collar and stretched his neck. The smell of Old Spice stung Roberts’s nose. Crandal breathed heavily, uncharacteristic for the seasoned veteran of high drama. Roberts knew what he was going to say before he spoke.

“I thought there were no leaks on Tempest.”

“There aren’t.”

“And I suppose you’re going to suggest the boy just happened to look up at me and pull the word out of thin air.”

“I don’t know, but it doesn’t necessarily mean he knows we orchestrated the invasion of Ethiopia. He couldn’t. He’s a kid, for goodness’ sake!”

“I don’t care if he’s a dog; he knows more than you think he knows! He stood there and stared me down, and I’m telling you this kid knows something!”

“And I’ll take care of him.”

“How could a kid come across this? He didn’t just grab a word like Tempest out of thin air. So who else knows? Find out. I don’t need to tell you what this could do to our mission. We just launched a war over there to keep Tempest quiet. And now a kid waltzes into one of our press conferences and fingers us? He could be Ethiopian for all we know, straight from the war zone!”

Roberts wanted to tell Crandal that the boy looked about as Ethiopian as Mickey Mouse, but his employer’s bone-rattling tone made him reconsider. And the questions were valid. He ground his teeth and took a deep breath. “I’ll take care of it,” he said.

Crandal paused, taking the time to breathe through his nostrils. “If it happens again, I may begin to doubt.”

“I said I’ll take care of it.”