His eyes flared even brighter, and a growl rose from somewhere deep inside him.
“If you join with the Chaser, I will come for you.”
Something about these two encounters was gnawing at me, and suddenly, I knew what it was.
“Why are you warning me? And, if you’re so determined to kill me, why wait? You had me tied to a chair and left me alive.”
The eyes watched me for several moments before, without warning, he disappeared. His vanishing act seemed to be the only thing he didn’t warn me about.
I stood outside, making sure he’d left for good, before looking around my neighborhood.
Did anyone see me talking to Harbinger? Was he invisible to others? Did I look like I was talking to a bush or something?
Time to get inside.
I let myself in and locked the door behind me. Dinner had made me sleepy, but Harbinger had ruined my plans for going to bed.
I couldn’t figure out why he was so intent on warning me about following Buddy.
What is his stake in keeping me from answering the call on my life? What is he afraid of?
The obvious finally occurred to me.
He must be a Runner! But why is he so concerned about me if Buddy hadn’t been able to catch him in the last thirty years? Could Harbinger fear me answering the call? No, can’t be.
I needed Buddy Daniels to answer some of these questions before I could make my decision, but inside I felt my spirit crying out, ‘go for it!’
Harbinger was big and scary, but for some reason, I wasn’t afraid that night.
I had to talk to Buddy and it had to be now. I grabbed my car keys and headed for the door.
Wait! I don’t know where Buddy lives. Crap!
I hung the keys back up and went to bed where I tossed and turned for what felt like hours. Eventually, I fell asleep.
CHAPTER 5
The next morning, I was up early.
I’m a private investigator. I can find Mr. Buddy Daniels.
My plan was to go to the office and do my normal process of ferreting out a person when I only know their name. Usually, I can scare up an address and find somebody within a few hours, but I outdid myself this morning.
He was waiting for me in my car.
I guess he figured it was no use hiding from a sharp P.I. like me. I got in my Ranchero, which I was pretty sure I had locked last night. He spoke without looking at me.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning to you. How long you been out here?”
“Not long. I have something to do, and I wanted you to come along.”
“Are we going chasing?”
A smile crossed his face.
“How did you know?”
I tapped my temple.
“Private investigator, remember?”
I started the car and backed out onto the street.
“Which way?”
“Take Kings Highway north to Florissant, then east to Gano.”
“Okay, you’re the navigator.”
Despite all the questions I had from the night before, I sensed Buddy wanted to focus. He didn’t speak, so I didn’t pry.
When we got to Gano Street, he told me to park across from a sprawling, red brick building. Bryan Elementary was a classic, inner-city school building. It resembled a brick castle, with ivy growing along the walls and white cement windowsills. It was in better condition than most schools the same age.
I could see the playground from where we sat, asphalt-covered, surrounded with black wrought iron fence. The area had recently been stocked with new plastic swings, slides, and ladders. Kids played in the July sun, and I could only assume it was summer school.
“Give me your hand?”
Buddy was staring into my eyes.
“What?”
“Give me your hand.”
I did. He held it with his right and put his left hand over my eyes.
“Dear Lord, I seek the power of sight for Jack. Let him see the things he must see this day, and may your understanding be in him. In Jesus name, amen.”
I repeated ‘Amen,’ blinked, and stared at Buddy. I didn’t feel any different. Buddy got out of the car and looked back through the window.
“Coming?”
Heck yeah, I’m coming!
“Right behind you.”
Buddy was leaning against the fence watching the kids play when I caught up with him. No one seemed to notice us, and after a few minutes, Buddy looked at me.
“You see her?”
“See who?”
“The mother. She’s over there.”
I followed his gaze toward the far side of the playground. Standing by the entrance to the playground was a woman. She was thin and tall, with brown hair hanging loosely to her shoulders. Despite the July heat, she wore a beige, long-sleeve sweater.
“Her?”
“Yes her.”
“You called her the mother; whose mother?”
“That little girl over there is her daughter.”
Alone on a ledge, not far from the door into the school, sat a young girl who wasn’t playing with the other kids. Thin with brown hair, her resemblance to the mother was obvious.
Buddy started to walk the sidewalk around the fence toward the mother.
“Come on.”
As we came around the corner, she didn’t seem to notice our presence. Buddy stopped and whispered.
“You stay here. Watch carefully.”
Buddy, wearing his robe, moved up next to the woman. She turned and surprise was evident on her face. Buddy began to speak to her, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying.
The woman nodded several times before looking toward the playground. When she looked back at Buddy, tears were rolling down her cheeks. Buddy spoke to her again, and she nodded once more. Again, she looked at the little girl sitting alone.
Finally, without taking her eyes off her daughter, she reached out toward Buddy. She took hold of the oversize wooden cross around his neck, a flash of light blinded me, and the woman was gone.
Buddy came walking back toward me, a smile on his face. I was stunned.
“What happened? Where’d she go?”
Buddy strode past me toward the car without slowing.
“She crossed over.”
I was struggling to keep up, both physically and mentally.
“Was she a Runner?”
“Yes.”
“Why did she run?”
“She was an atheist. When she began to cross over, she realized God is real and wanted to warn her daughter.”
We reached the car, and stood on opposite sides, facing each other over the hood.
“Did you kill her?”
“No, I didn’t need to.”
“Why not?”
“She went voluntarily.”
I tried to sort out my thoughts as I drove, before launching into another round of questions.
“How was she going to warn her daughter? Wasn’t she a spirit?”
“Indeed, she was. Runners get stronger with every passing day. They eventually get the power to become corporeal.”
“You mean they’re human again?”
“Not exactly. They can manifest to be seen, touch things, write things, and so on.”
We’d only gone a short distance when we came to O’Fallon City Park. I pulled into the parking lot and stopped the car. I can usually talk and drive, but this was too much to take in.
“So eventually she would’ve become strong enough to contact her daughter and tell her about God?”
“Yes.”
“Wait a second! Doesn’t God want all people to believe in him? Why wouldn’t he want the girl to be told about Him?”
Buddy sighed.
“That was my exact thought when I saw my mentor, Justin, cross someone over for the first time. But the dynamic changes after you’re dead. While we live on this Earth, we have the choice of salvation through Christ, or not. But when we die, the choice dies with
us. Anyone who tries to change the way God set it up is trying to circumvent God’s plan.”
“So what if the mother had been successful?”
“You mean if she’d warned her daughter?”
“Yeah, then what?”
“The Holy Spirit would take her.”
“Take her? What does that mean?”
“She would’ve died.”
“The little girl?”
“Yes.”
I was stunned, again.
How could the Holy Spirit kill someone?
Buddy sat looking straight ahead, not moving, waiting for my next question.
“Why?”
“God seeks people who worship by free will. The mother warning the girl would remove the daughter’s freewill choice. Therefore, she must be taken in her current state of salvation, whatever it is.”
I sat for a minute and tried to let what Buddy was saying sink in. Eventually, I started the car and headed for home. We didn’t speak the rest of the way, and Buddy hopped out when we arrived back at my place. Shutting the door, he looked back at me through the window.
“Have you figured it out yet?”
I had.
“You told the mother if she warned her child, the child would die, and her chance to be saved would be lost. She chose to cross over and give her daughter the chance to live her life, to find God on her own.”
“Exactly. We spared her daughter’s life by making her mother cross over.”
“How did you do it? I mean I saw the flash of light, but how?”
“This,” he lifted the oversize cross on his chest, “is made from the Cedars of Lebanon. It’s blessed and imbued with the power of the Chaser. When she took hold, it sent her over.”
My mind spun. Information overload had taken hold, and I needed a break. My office and some mundane sleuthing seemed to be in order.
“I’ll talk to you later, Buddy.”
He turned and walked toward his car.
“Sounds good.”
*******
An hour later, I was in my office listening to my messages.
I made an appointment for this afternoon to meet Mrs. Samms at the Heritage Cafeteria. I still hadn’t figured out how I was going to tell her about her husband’s second job without spoiling the surprise, but I figured I would come up with something at the last minute.
I decided to bounce another question off Mandy, and hoped she wouldn’t react like the other night. I’d felt like a cornered rat when she started grilling me. I dialed her number.
“Hello.”
“Hey Mandy, it’s me. You busy?”
“Not at the moment. What’s up?”
“I’m wanting your take on something else I’ve been thinking about.”
“Shoot.”
Suddenly, I wasn’t sure how to word it. In fact, I wasn’t sure what it was I wanted to ask her. I guess I just wanted to talk to someone that wasn’t a spirit, or chasing a spirit.
She sensed my hesitation. “Jack? What is it?”
“Nothing, I’m sorry to bug you.”
“You know you can call me anytime, to talk about anything, right?”
“I know, and thanks.”
I could tell she was waiting for me to tell her why I called, but I changed the subject instead.
“You had a good time last night?”
“You know I did. Is there something else?”
“No. I gotta meet a client, so I’ll talk to you later.”
“Okaaaay. Nice not talking to you, Jack.”
“Same here.”
I hung up feeling more than a little foolish. I checked my watch and realized I needed to hurry if I was going to be on time to meet Mrs. Samms.
********
Heritage Cafeteria was only four blocks from my office and a walk, even though it was quite warm out, seemed inviting. It might make me a little late, but maybe I could come up with what I was going to say to Mrs. Samms, before I got there.
A few minutes later, I arrived to find Mrs. Samms sitting near the front window with a cup of coffee. Her jet-black hair and pale complexion made her easy to spot. I got myself one and joined her.
“Hello, Mr. Carter. You have news about my husband?”
An attractive lady, she had bright blue eyes and a smile that normally revealed a set of perfect white teeth. She wasn’t smiling at the moment, and in fact appeared quite tense as I sat across from her at the table.
“Yes, ma’am. I’ve finished with your case.”
“Really? And what did you find? Is my husband cheating on me?”
“No, Mrs. Samms. I couldn’t find any evidence of another woman in his life.”
She looked skeptical, as if I was holding something back. Of course I was, but not what she thought.
“Well, where is he going after work three times a week? He keeps telling me not to worry, that it’s nothing.”
I pulled out my bill, put it under a picture, and slid both across the table in her direction. The picture showed her husband entering a downtown bar. He worked three nights a week as a bartender there. She looked at it, then me.
“A bar? He’s going to a bar, but no woman is meeting him?”
“That’s correct. On three separate occasions, I followed him in, and observed what he was doing. He was at the bar, talked to anyone who talked to him, and watched some sports.”
The adage ‘a half-truth is a whole lie’ ran through my head, but I was sure she would understand when she got the rest of the story from her husband. Everything I had seen indicated Mr. Samms loved his wife and was faithful.
“He can watch sports at home. It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Sometimes men need guy time.”
“I guess.”
She looked at my bill before pulling her checkbook out of her purse. She wrote the check and handed it to me.
“Thank you, Mr. Carter.”
“You’re welcome, Mrs. Samms.”
I watched her walk away and was about to leave myself when I noticed a man standing near the door. Tall and thin, with black hair that was graying at the temples, he appeared to be in his early forties. He didn’t have any food or drink; nor was he in line to order.
A teenage girl, wearing black khakis and a white button-down shirt, moved food trays between the kitchen and the serving tables. She was bringing hot food out to the cafeteria line, and returning empty pans to the kitchen. Despite his obvious staring, the dark-haired girl didn’t seem to notice the man.
People walked in front of him, without excusing themselves, and he didn’t speak to anyone. He suddenly rushed forward and said something to the girl, but she refused to look at him. In fact, she acted as if he wasn’t there.
My curiosity got the better of me. I left my table, walking toward him, and he seemed to notice me immediately. When I reached him, I started to ask what he was doing. Fear crossed his face and he bolted for the door.
I followed him out of the restaurant, several steps behind. When I got outside, he was nowhere in sight.
Weird. But then again, my life seemed to functioning on the ‘weird’ setting these days.
I turned and started walking back toward my office when I spotted a white robe headed my direction. I stopped and waited until Buddy got to me.
I laughed.
“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to see you here, but let me say it anyway. What are you doing here?”
I noticed, despite wearing a robe in July, he didn’t appear to be sweating. He took me by the elbow and steered me towards a bench not far from where we stood.
“I’ve been following someone and they happened to cross paths with you. I’d say it wasn’t intentional.”
“Do you mean you were chasing someone?”
“Yes.”
Two and two finally started to add up to four.
“This guy you were chasing…”
“I didn’t say it was a man.”
“Okay, but if I’m right, he was tall and thin…bl
ack hair?”
“Yes.”
“I saw him in the cafeteria. He freaked when he saw me.”
Buddy gave me that ‘figure it out for yourself’ look. I ran the events in the restaurant back through my head, then snapped my fingers.
“It wasn’t that he saw me, it was that I saw him, right?”
Buddy looked pleased.
“Correct. He probably knew if you could see him, you might be able to send him back. That’s why he ran.”
“But why could I see him?”
“The prayer I said at the school opened your eyes, and they will stay open as long as you stay on the path. If you choose not to chase, the sight will be removed.”
Made sense to me, I guess.
“Who’s the girl?”
“The one he was watching?”
I nodded.
“His daughter. He never knew her in his lifetime. He wanted to meet her before he crossed over, and he didn’t believe me when I told him he would end her life by contacting her.”
“Did you get him to cross over?”
He nodded.
“How? I mean, I know how it happens when they agree, but what about someone like him?”
He pulled back the hem of his robe to reveal the short wooden sword.
“You stabbed him with that? Kinda dull, isn’t it?”
“He was a spirit when I pierced him. Neither the cross nor the sword will work if they are manifested in human form.”
My head was beginning to spin again, and the time seemed right for more coffee. Espresso this time.
“I’m running over to Starbucks, you want something?”
He shook his head, pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, and handed it to me.
“What’s this?”
“My address. Can you come for lunch tomorrow? I want you to meet my Sarah.”
“Your Sarah? You’re married?”
“Yes, why so surprised?”
I thought about it. Yoda wasn’t married, or was he?
“I guess I thought chasing precluded any personal life.”
He smiled.
“I wouldn’t have made it this long in my ministry without her support.”
I looked at the address. It was on the outskirts of the city on the south side.
CROSSOVER (THE CHASER CHRONICLES Book 1) Page 3