Prophet

by Frank Peretti

  John received the warning. But the warning also made him think of Dad and another question John had on his list. “Was that true in Dad’s case? Did he have enemies?”

  She didn’t take her answer lightly. “I believe he did. Prophets are never without enemies.”

  “Any idea who they might be?”

  She almost laughed. “Well, where would you like me to start? I have over thirty years to cover.”

  He smiled back. “Then how about recently? Anyone who may have meant him harm recently?”

  “You mean, who may have killed him?”

  John wasn’t sure he heard that. Then again, he knew he did. “Well . . . yes.”

  She shook her head. John didn’t want to disturb Mom with his theories.

  “Well . . . of course, I’m not saying he was killed . . .”

  “No, John. But that’s what you’re thinking, and that’s what I’m thinking.”

  John had to double-check. “You think Dad was killed?”

  She nodded.

  “You mean murdered?”

  “Yes.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “What makes you think that?”

  John felt they’d skipped a question in here somewhere. “I . . . uh . . . well, I do think he was killed. At least I lean heavily in that direction.”

  “Which is something those pipe racks never do.”

  Another surprise. “You know about the pipe rack?”

  “I know about all of them. I helped your father buy them and set them up when we moved into that warehouse sixteen years ago. I know what they’ll do—stand there for years—and what they won’t do—dump over for no reason when no one but Dad is there. And I went down there and had Chuck show me what was left of that pipe rack, and he told me about the forklift theory.”

  “He told you about the—”

  “Now, now, I asked him directly, and he knew he’d have to tell me. I’m his boss now, remember? But I do appreciate you wanting to spare me some pain.”

  John was stuck for a moment. He still had some things to learn about his mother. “So, okay . . . any theories, Mom? Why would someone want to kill Dad?”

  “I don’t know. But I have faith that someday we will.”

  “But what about . . .” John hesitated. “Mom, I hate to ask a question like this, but . . .”

  She shook her head. “John, all your father ever did was sell pipe. He never sold drugs or laundered money or did anything else that would make him a criminal.” Then she chuckled and said, “Except for blocking abortion clinics. He has done that.”

  “What about his friendship with Max Brewer?”

  “They spent a lot of time together. Dad was hoping he could find out who killed Annie. You know about that.”

  “What about Max Brewer’s circle of acquaintances or enemies? I wonder if Dad crossed any of them.”

  She shrugged. “Son, I think you and I know basically the same things, and God knows the rest.”

  John gave a wry smile. “And I’m supposed to be a prophet. Do you think God will tell me?”

  She could only answer, “Son, God will do as He pleases.” And then her eyes twinkled as she reveled in the thought. “You can count on that.”

  MONDAY JOHN REPORTED to the station at 9 in the morning, quite early for him. His regular shift began at 1 in the afternoon, but this was the week of the Big Push, as Ben Oliver called it, and he and Ali Downs were scheduled for some photo and video promotional shoots.

  The news set was already undergoing some changes. A crew of carpenters, tool belts jingling and saws screaming, were tearing out a whole wall to make room for the camera boom, a giant, mechanical arm supporting a robotic camera that would provide an extreme high-angle shot of the news set and then swoop down on the cast of performers for a dramatic entry into the show. One of the conceptualizers for the project was even pondering how to combine that moving shot with another taken from Chopper 6 as it swooped down on the Channel 6 building, creating the effect of one continuous swoop from the sky, through the roof, and into the news set.

  “The viewer must have no doubts,” Ben said, “that this is NewsSix! No other station can top this one!”

  In front of a bank of monitors with still pictures pasted over their screens, Ali Downs was ready for the camera, looking stunning as usual. John looked good, all made up and suited up and ready to sell the news. Marvin the photographer, a chubby, bearded, fretting little man in a purple T-shirt and blue jeans, had several strobes, umbrella reflectors, and floods set up, and now he was peering through the viewfinder of his big camera on a tripod.

  “I want news, I want action, I want . . . I want intensity,” he chattered. He would have made a good acting coach. “Okay, now read that copy.”

  Ali and John had some dummy scripts and looked at them.

  “Ali,” Marvin said, waving his hand at them, “you’re checking a story with John. You’re concerned about its accuracy, okay?”

  Ali held her script for John to see it. “John, what do you think of this? I don’t trust the source. And look at that spelling!”

  Flash.

  “Hmmm,” said John, furrowing his brow at the script. “Does this reporter work for us?”

  They both cracked up. Flash.

  “Hey, come on, come on, let’s get serious!” said Marvin.

  John read from the script, “A retarded chicken hatches a billiard ball, that story coming up next!”

  “Yeah, that’s good, that’s good.” Marvin kept peering down through the viewfinder. All they could see was the top of his head. “Now look at me. Make me trust you.”

  “I wouldn’t lie to you,” said Ali in mock seriousness. Flash.

  They smiled. Flash.

  They looked at the script again. Flash.

  They posed with a TV camera. Flash.

  John in shirtsleeves. Flash.

  Ali close-up, jotting notes. Flash. Flash.

  “Wet your lips and smile.” Flash.

  “Lean forward, John. Ali, move in.” Flash.

  “Okay, turn this way a little. Closer together.” Flash. Flash. Flash.

  Then the video shoot. Mounted cameras, handheld cameras, high angles, floor angles, close-ups, traveling shots. News in the making. Faces full of business—the world’s going to end if we don’t get this story out, working, editing, rushing about, handheld shots racing through the newsroom, quick conversations, zoom-in shots of John, then a blurry pan, then Ali brought into focus and zoomed in some more. Intensity, intensity, more intensity. John with sleeves rolled up, banging away at the computer, not just taking but tearing news copy from the printer, nodding in agreement with no one in particular. Ali busy at work, then consulting with a reporter (over-the-shoulder shot), then a wry, you’re-not-fooling-me smile at someone off-camera.

  Ben dropped in from time to time to get a taste of what was brewing. His orders were clear and crusty at the start of the day: “Sell it.” So the strobes kept flashing, and the video cameras kept grinding, and John and Ali kept looking busy, intense, and outstandingly honest. Ben didn’t say much, but his narrowed eyes and tight smile indicated he was pleased.

  THAT SAME MORNING, before Leslie had to report to the station for her shift, she and Deanne Brewer met at the Westland Memorial Hospital, walked down long halls past numbered doorways, workstations, patients in wheelchairs, a green plant or two, and much inscrutable art, turned corners, took elevators, read floor directories, asked directions, and finally found themselves in Medical Records, a pleasant, glassed-in office with six desks neatly arranged and quiet people seated behind them shuffling papers, marking files, answering phones.

  At the nearest desk a lady named Rose with neon-red hair asked if she could help them, and they asked her for Annie Delores Brewer’s autopsy report.

  “Do you have a release form?” Rose asked.

  Deanne had it ready. She’d gotten it the day before, and she and Max had filled it out meticulously, answering a volley o
f questions: who they were, where and when they were born, where they now lived, where they worked, their income, their Social Security numbers, any run-ins they may have had with the law (Max had had a few).

  “And I’ll need some picture ID,” Rose instructed. Deanne produced her driver’s license. Rose then typed Max and Deanne’s names and numbers into a computer and waited for the results.

  The results were immediate but not good. “That file is not accessible.”

  Leslie wasn’t surprised. She had to hold her tongue.

  “What do you mean?” Deanne asked, her temperature rising.

  “It’s protected under the privacy laws.”

  “But I’m Annie’s mother!”

  Rose only shook her head. “I’m sorry. The document is not accessible.”

  Deanne was visibly angry. “Now wait a minute! You are talking to Annie’s mother! Her blood parent!”

  Rose only raised her hands and shrugged. “By law the autopsy report is not accessible to the parents if it contains certain information protected by the privacy laws.”

  Now that was interesting. Leslie asked, “Certain information?”

  “Yes.”

  “And just what kind of information would that be?”

  Rose played dumb, and very poorly. “Oh, I would have no idea. It could be anything.”

  Deanne knew she was addressing one tiny wheel in a very big machine, but she had to lecture somebody. “Well listen, my husband and I have been through the wringer with this hospital before, and we’ve been put off and shuffled around and given excuses and told all kinds of things that we can’t do and can’t know and can’t ask and can’t find out, and I am getting sick of it, you hear?”

  Rose didn’t like being lectured. “Mrs. Brewer, if you wish to see the autopsy report, you’ll have to come back here with a court order. Otherwise . . .” and her long fingernail tapped the counter with each word, “the file is not accessible.”

  Deanne’s face sank as she began to lose hope.

  “Wait a minute,” said Leslie. “What about the pathologist who performed the autopsy? We’d like to speak with him.”

  Rose shook her head. “He’s legally barred from saying anything.”

  Leslie lost no momentum. “His name is Denning. We’d like to speak to him please.”

  Rose sighed. “You’re not going to like this either—he’s not here anymore.”

  “Then can you tell us where he went? We’d like to contact him.”

  “Well, all we have is his office number here at the hospital, but like I said, he doesn’t work here anymore.”

  “What . . .” asked Deanne, “did they fire him?”

  Rose was getting impatient. “I don’t know, Mrs. Brewer!”

  “What about a home phone number?” asked Leslie.

  Rose smiled apologetically. “I’m sure we wouldn’t have it, and even if we did, I couldn’t give it out.”

  Deanne waxed sarcastic. “Woooooo, you have been a world of help today, sugar!”

  Leslie checked her watch. She had to go. “Come on, Deanne, let’s get out of here.”

  Deanne was not ready to leave. “But I . . . there has to be something we can do.”

  “Yeah, there is. We’re going to get a lawyer.” Leslie glared not so much at Rose as at the bureaucracy she represented. “We’ll just have to take the gloves off.”

  CHAPTER 15

  TUESDAY MORNING, JOHN met Max and Deanne Brewer at the law offices of Hart, McLoughlin, Peters, and Sanborn, attorneys-at-law, located in a remodeled, turn-of-the-century mansion of brick, rough beams, and stucco.

  “We’re here to see Aaron Hart,” John told the receptionist.

  “And then I’m outa here,” Max muttered, his eyes exploring the deep carpets, ornate woodwork, heavy oak doors, and fancy fixtures. “How much this gonna cost?”

  “We can’t afford an attorney,” Deanne said flatly. She was having second thoughts as well.

  John urged, “Well, just talk to him first and see what he says.”

  A young man with thinning, neatly parted red hair and a dark blue suit walked briskly into the room and extended his hand toward John. “Hey, John!”

  John shook hands with him. “How you doin’, Aaron?”

  Deanne tried not to gawk at Aaron Hart. Max gawked and didn’t care who knew it. Who was this wimpy white kid, and what was he doing in a place like this? He was so short his tie hung below his belt.

  John turned to Max and Deanne and introduced the attorney. “Max and Deanne Brewer, I’d like you to meet Aaron Hart. He’s a good attorney, and he’s pushed some important papers for me on more than one occasion.”

  The wimpy white kid extended his hand. “Hi—glad to meet you.”

  Deanne rose and shook his hand, feeling timid despite herself. Max stood boldly and towered over the attorney, giving him a firm handshake and staring him down a bit.

  “Why don’t we step into my office?”

  “You’re a lawyer?” Max asked.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How much you gonna charge us?” Max demanded.

  Aaron didn’t mind answering. “That depends on what I do. Why don’t we talk first—that won’t cost you anything—and then we’ll know what I can do and whether you want me to do it. Fair enough?”

  Max stole a glance at John, whose face and little shrug answered, Fair enough—sure, what the heck.

  “Okay.”

  John said, “Okay, I’ve done my part.” He touched Max’s shoulder. “Hear him out. He’ll deal squarely with you.”

  Max nodded.

  “Keep in touch.” And with that, John made his exit.

  “Right this way,” said Aaron Hart.

  Max and Deanne followed him down the wainscoted hallway to a bedroom-become-office where he offered them two comfortable chairs in front of his desk.

  “Can I get you anything?”

  They decided on coffee. Aaron called someone named Linda on his intercom and made the request.

  Then he relaxed in his chair, picked up an NFL paperweight to play with, and said gently, “John told me about your daughter. I’m very sorry.”

  “Thank you,” Deanne answered. Max just nodded.

  “John’s told me a little bit about your case. Why don’t you tell me what happened and how I can help.”

  It took time to establish trust, to find the words, to feel right about this appointment, but as Max and Deanne got into their story and Aaron Hart showed a genuine interest and concern, the images, feelings, and frustrations they’d experienced since May 24th gave them plenty to talk about until they were almost crowding each other to share everything replaying in their minds. With tears of sorrow and sometimes a raised voice of anger, they worked through it until finally arriving at the bottom line, the reason for this meeting: their daughter was wrongfully dead. What could they do?

  Sometime during their story, Linda had brought the coffee. Now Aaron moved his cup aside and began to scribble on a legal pad, thinking a little out loud, a little on paper. “Hm. So . . . the first thing you want to do is make sure Annie died due to negligence on the part of the Women’s Medical Center, and in order to do that you need to find a legal way to get Annie’s records from the clinic.”

  Max and Deanne exchanged a consulting look, and then Max answered, “Yeah, that’s one thing,” and Deanne added, “I just want to stop that clinic so they don’t hurt somebody else.”

  “Mm-hm.” Aaron stopped scribbling and thought for a moment. “Well, initially you have two courses of action. The first is to file a lawsuit against the clinic, but . . .” He smiled whimsically. “Kind of a Catch-22 in that. You can’t sue the clinic unless you have a case against them, and you can’t build a case against them unless you have Annie’s medical records to prove she got her abortion there, and you can’t get those records without filing a lawsuit so you can subpoena the medical records as part of the discovery, which you can’t do unless you have a case, which you don’t have w
ithout the medical records . . .” With a waving of his hand he concluded, “Let’s forget that idea.”

  He leaned forward and wiggled his pen in his hand as he spoke. “There’s a simpler way to do it which would not involve a lawsuit, and that’s only because—and please pardon me for saying this—it’s only because Annie is now dead. If she were still alive, then her abortion would have been a fundamental right, and any records or chart the clinic might have on her would be protected and confidential, even from her parents. Only Annie herself could request them. But now, since she’s dead, you can take steps to stand in her place legally and request her medical records.”

  Aaron got lively and animated, as if telling a story, talking with his hands. “Now, anytime somebody dies they usually leave something behind, something they owned. That’s called their estate. If you own a big house and three cars and you have a couple million in the bank, that’s your estate—that’s what’s left when you die. If you own the clothes on your back, one ballpoint pen, and two nickels, that’s your estate. So Annie had an estate too, and that’s what we’ll be working with.”

  Max and Deanne did a quick mental inventory.

  “She didn’t own much,” Deanne said.

  Aaron only smiled, undaunted. “Well, that’s what I’m getting to. She did own one thing that’s important to us now, and that’s a claim for damages she may have suffered at the Women’s Medical Center. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

  “Here’s what we can do: we can file a probate of your daughter’s estate. Now probate is the process of transferring assets that your daughter owned at her death, which is no big deal since she was a minor, your daughter, and didn’t own much anyway, but it would still provide a legal way for you to get those records. You could have yourself appointed as the personal representative of Annie’s estate, meaning you’d be standing in her place to . . . we call it ‘marshaling’ . . . it would be your duty to marshal the assets of the estate, which means to figure out what the deceased person owned, what monies, property, and claims she owned or had a right to at the instant of her death.