CHAPTER 26

I wish I could have watched as life returned to Espy. She’s tried to describe what it was like when she returned the favor, but she hasn’t been able to find the right words; only that there was nothing overtly magical, like bright lights or music or angels— just an absolute knowledge that she witnessed something otherworldly.

That was two weeks ago. Two weeks of trying to clean up the messes we’ve made.

When Espy and I walked into the office of the consulate general of the United States in Melbourne, I was convinced that we were bound for long jail terms. We’d left a trail of bodies behind us, two of them prominent members of the business and political communities. We had little going for us, beyond the fact that the two men killed at Jim’s house would eventually be identified as drawing from the Manheim payroll. That, and the discovery that the younger Manheim had powder burns on his hands, and the gun found with his body was determined to be the one used on the father. Still, I thought the odds were good that I would have a long tenure within the Australian penal system. About all I could hope for was that our respective embassies would provide gratis legal assistance, and a way to shield us from at least a portion of the punishment we were sure to receive. We decided, together, that we could not tell anyone about the bones—no matter the cost.

Then it just went away. One day the Australian Federal Police were interviewing us, for the twentieth time, and the next day we were free to go. No explanation. I would find, days later, that none of it had wound up in the press. Not a single mention, beyond the murder/suicide that killed a prominent family in Ballarat, and the death of an elderly couple in a house fire near Laverton. I am angered that the story surrounding Jim and Meredith was spun to be a lie; I have my suspicions about who made it happen. I wonder when the people of the oblong S will come calling—looking for the bones to hand over to the next caretakers.

Espy sits next to me in the Humvee. She’s quiet. She has been this way since the police let us go. I think, though, that it’s not a bad quiet as she’s going over in her mind everything that has happened, and I imagine it will take some time. I know how she feels. There is much that I need to ponder in the coming days, much of it related to responding to a God who has proven himself to be something other than fiction. For the first time in years, maybe I can do it without artifice, without cynicism. But I sincerely hope that’s not a spiritual prerequisite, because I might be sunk.

Right now that’s not important. There’s only one thing that is.


The wind feels warm against my cheek and I squint to keep the sand from entering my eyes. The sun is in that place just above the horizon where it seems to hang forever before beginning a grudging descent, as if having second thoughts about allowing the moon to replace it in the sky. For a few moments I stand and watch the dunes form and then re-form themselves, the grains of sand as fluid as water, making the desert an inconstant thing.

The Humvee is behind me, packed with enough water and food to last two weeks, along with extra gas, a radio, a tent, and anything else I could think to add to the manifest. But the most important item is the shovel, which I hold in my hands. It’s old, pitted and worn, and seems appropriate to the task.

While the sun disappears, I dig a hole in the solid ground beneath the sand cover. It is hard work, but I don’t mind. It’s a penance of sorts. I dig it deep, each shovelful of earth like an offering. And when I’ve finished, when the desert air has turned cool and sweat runs down my body, I pick up the bones, wrapped in burlap, and drop them in the hole. And as the disturbed dirt falls back on them, I do not feel any guilt, no sense of loss. I work until the earth is packed down.

When I return to the truck, I toss the shovel into the back and then take Espy’s hand in mine, and we stay there until the light is gone.