Prophet

by Frank Peretti

  “So I ran to my car . . . We’d shuffled cars around. I’d driven over to Hillary’s and then we both rode in her car to school and then back to her house from the clinic. We were trying to keep everything secret, you know? So my car was parked a few blocks away, and I ran and got in my car and drove home, and my folks weren’t home yet, which was a good thing because I know they would have seen something was wrong. But by the time they got home the word was getting around, and they’d already heard that Hillary had been taken to the hospital, and then they told me and . . . from then on I didn’t have to hide how upset I was, I could just flow with it because everybody was upset.

  “So . . . when Hillary died I just came apart, and my mom and dad felt real sorry for me, and they were great, but . . . I never told them what really happened. I never said a word, even after the governor told my dad that story about Hillary taking his pills by mistake . . . even after it came out on the news.

  “And you know, for a while I wasn’t really sure. I thought maybe that really was what caused it. Maybe Hillary was taking those pills and then had the abortion and then had the bleeding because of the pills, but . . . I know she wasn’t having her period. I mean, she was pregnant!—so why would she be taking pills for menstrual cramps? And why would she get into her father’s pills in the first place? She had her own bottle of pills in her room and she knew what they looked like. She wasn’t stupid.

  “But then the governor came to see me. He came over to the house to have a private little talk with me, to give me some comfort, you know, and my folks were really glad he was being so thoughtful. But you know what? He came to make sure I wasn’t going to say anything. I don’t know how he figured out I knew anything about it. I didn’t ask, and . . . you know, neither one of us said anything directly about it. He just said things like, ‘We both loved Hillary very much, and we wouldn’t want anyone to know things about her that are private and her own business.’ And then he told me, ‘I believe in privacy, so I’m not going to ask any personal questions, not about you, and not about Hillary.’ And then he said, ‘But I’d like you to do me a favor, a very big favor, and that is, please respect Hillary’s privacy and reputation, and keep this as something only you and Hillary shared.’”

  Shannon laughed a small, derisive laugh. “Something only I and Hillary shared. He made it sound so honorable, so virtuous, like I was doing my best friend a favor as only a best friend can do.

  “And you know, it took me a while to figure out what he was really doing. I wasn’t going to tell anyone anyway, but then he came and gave me his big ‘privacy’ pitch, and then, just a few days after that, his number two man, Martin Devin, called me and told me I’d been chosen to receive the first scholarship and that I could go to Midwestern if I wanted, all expenses paid, and . . .” She shook her head incredulously. “And I still didn’t get it. I accepted the scholarship and enrolled at the university, and I had this big idea in my head that I was going in Hillary’s memory, and I thought that was so great, but . . . I always had an inkling that the governor had his own agenda in mind, and now I’m convinced of it.”

  She got a sudden thought that wasn’t in her notes. “And you know what else convinces me? He took Hayley and Hyatt out of the Adam Bryant School right after all this, and it was close to the end of the school year! Nobody really knew why, but it all makes sense to me now. The school sent Hillary to that clinic to have an abortion behind her father’s back, and he couldn’t stand that. Hayley and Hyatt are going to a Catholic school now—surprise, surprise! Governor Slater talks all about privacy, privacy, privacy, but when it happens to his own kids, watch out!

  “Anyway, I get a call from this Martin Devin character almost every week, and he’s getting to be a real pest. He just keeps calling to make sure I’m okay and make sure I know they’re still watching me, still making sure I keep quiet. Well, last time I told him the press wanted to talk to me and I just might talk to them, and I told him he could have the money back, that I was sick of the whole thing.” Shannon heaved a deep sigh. “Oh, and did that ever feel good! He got real upset, but I felt great. Now I know what I’m going to do, and . . . Well, a lot of people aren’t going to like it, I know, but I have to do it anyway. I can’t carry this anymore.”

  Deanne put her arm around Shannon and pulled her close.

  Shannon returned the embrace, and they remained that way for a moment, just savoring the closeness and kinship that had formed between them in such a short time. Their stories, their pains, and their fears were so very much the same, and now each woman had found in the other a beautiful answer to her need.

  MAX DIDN’T WANT to leave the Commons in case the guy from the rally decided to slip away or, worse yet, attack Deanne and Shannon. He kept an eye on the character with the newspaper, but then managed to catch the attention of a passing student.

  “Hey kid!” he almost whispered, beckoning to the young man.

  The young man stopped, a little curious, a little suspicious. “Yeah?”

  “You got police around here?”

  The young man smelled trouble. He was interested.

  “Campus police?”

  “Yeah, any police!”

  “Sure.”

  “Call ’em. Get me one . . . right now!”

  CHAPTER 27

  NIGHT FELL OVER the Midwestern University campus, and with the loss of the sun the temperature dropped to that crawling, autumn kind of cold that settles into the pockets and valleys like clouds of dry ice and turns the edges of the leaves and grass frosty-white by morning. The between-class bustle and rush of the daytime was now an intermittent trickle of students, most wearing warm coats, crossing the campus to attend libraries, late classes, cultural events, and political meetings. Now the amber floodlights came on to illumine the main walkways and malls, and the shadows beneath the trees and behind the thick shrubbery became ink-black.

  Ted Canan was ready—ready and altogether patient, like a skilled and ruthless hunter. He would only have one chance, one opportunity, and he was willing to wait for the right one. When it came, he would be quick, the results would be final, and he would be out of there, ready to fly back west and collect his payment.

  He’d gotten to know the landscaping around the campus, especially the pockets of blackness and covering that lay along the several routes to Clark Hall, one of the girls’ dormitories—the dormitory he was most interested in. He’d kept track of Shannon DuPliese all through the day, even during the hours she’d visited with that black lady, whoever she was. He hadn’t been on campus long enough to find a reliable pattern in the girl’s routine, but tonight showed some promise because he knew where she was now, where she would be, and when. After having dinner with those black folks at the North Campus Diner, she’d gone to the Research Library. The Library closed at 11:00, and that hour was fast approaching. Unless she took a long, circuitous route around the perimeter of the campus, she would have to choose between two possible routes back to Clark Hall, both of which presented very short but very good windows of opportunity.

  The most favorable route included a narrow stretch of concrete walkway that ran behind the stadium bleachers, flanked by a sheer concrete wall on one side and a thick, wooded area on the other. At a key spot there was a small trail leading from the walkway into the woods with one row of bushes forming a perfect blind where he could wait. He’d plotted out several quick escape routes from that area—one down a service alley behind the BioMed Library and out to the avenue bordering the campus’s west side, the other south through a botanical garden that was perfectly designed to hide a fleeing killer like him and bordered on the main street leading to the Medical Center. Either way, if things went well he would be long gone before this girl was even missed.

  The other route she might follow would be a little riskier because the vegetation wasn’t quite as thick and an escape route was further away, across open space. If she chose that route, he might not make his move tonight.

  In any ev
ent he’d picked out a vantage point from which he could see which route she chose and then outrace her to the place of ambush. And that was where he now crouched, silent, dressed in black, patient.

  SHANNON DUPLIESE TRIED to study but couldn’t keep her mind on it. She looked up at the clock on the wall. 10:55 P.M. The Research Library would be closing soon, and she was getting very nervous. She put her book away. She might as well quit for the night.

  11:05 P.M. As Ted Canan watched from his vantage point, two young men walked along the main thoroughfare from the Research Library, talking quietly, their heads and shoulders illumined by the amber floodlights. Then two women. Then a man and woman holding hands and laughing. He remained still. She would come soon.

  Two faculty members came by, one of them earnestly trying to make a point and the other not going along with it until they rounded a corner and their voices faded.

  Then one lone man, walking briskly in the cold.

  Then, some distance behind him, alone, came Shannon DuPliese. He recognized her long, brown coat and the thick stocking cap she wore on the crown of her head, now pulled down around her face against the cold. She was carrying her large canvas carrier over her shoulder in typical fashion, and she seemed to be in a hurry.

  Okay, baby, which will it be? He watched as she approached the Graphic Arts building, for at that point she would turn right and follow the path that went behind the stadium bleachers or would turn left and walk up the steeper route through the trees and along the parking lot.

  She reached the Graphic Arts building. She stopped. What was she doing? She set her bag on the pavement and looked through it. Had she forgotten something? Too late now, baby, the library’s closed.

  She looked back in his direction. He didn’t flinch. He knew she couldn’t see him up in these bushes.

  Then she seemed to make up her mind. She picked up her bag . . . and turned right.

  C’mon, c’mon, do it, make me happy. Yeah! She was going to take the better route for sure.

  She was heading that way, not turning back.

  He bolted from his hiding place, bounded up the hill, over a short bridge, and down the winding path toward the stadium. Then, at a predetermined entry point, he bounded like a black gazelle into the woods and wove his way through the trees and bushes to the ambush point, making it there well ahead of her.

  He crouched behind the bush blind, his heart racing, his adrenaline pumping. He was already seeing it happen in his mind’s eye; he could already feel his hand around her throat.

  Looking up the walkway, he could just see the boundary of the last floodlight’s amber circle. Between that circle and himself was just the right kind of darkness, and so far there were no other human beings passing by.

  He heard her footsteps before he saw her. His body tensed, and he fell especially silent.

  The footsteps continued, clicking evenly and quickly along the concrete, growing louder and more definite as they approached.

  Then he saw her pass through the last reach of the amber light and into the darkness, into his snare.

  She was walking down the center of the walkway, her head down, the cap pulled down against the cold, her arms close to her chest, her bag over her shoulder. She was walking blind. He’d be on her before she knew a thing.

  She came closer. He prepared for his leap.

  She came alongside his hiding place.

  He leaped from behind the blind, silent as a spirit, a blurred shadow, a sinewy demon of death. His arms closed about her shoulders, his hand clamped over her mouth, and she made no sound. She struggled, bending, twisting, but he had her in a steel grip and now he was going to finish it quickly. He began pulling her toward the woods.

  Uuuhhh! He felt like his groin would come out his throat. The blow kinked his spine, and the pain numbed his brain except for one thought: hang onto her, hang on. He managed to keep his grip on her as he tried to recover from the pain that coursed up his body.

  Wump! An elbow rammed his ribs so hard he felt he would never breathe again.

  Somehow one of her arms got free, and her palm slammed into his face. He stumbled backward. How did her foot get behind him? He tripped over it and slammed flat on the pavement.

  Footsteps! Running footsteps! They were closing on him! The game was over. The hunter had become the hunted.

  He got to his feet, his legs wobbly, his back bent, his guts threatening to pour out of his quivering body.

  “Freeze!” came the shout from further up the walkway. “Police!”

  He pushed with his legs, one at a time—it didn’t feel like running—and made for the woods. Out of the corner of his eye he could see a cop dressed up like Shannon DuPliese aiming a .38 at him.

  He got to the edge of the woods, took two painful steps into the bushes, and ran into a huge, muscular wall with powerful arms and raging eyes.

  “Where you goin’, man?” the wall asked before shoving him back onto the concrete, where he went tumbling again.

  He got back on his feet in an instant, ready to run, but the big black man already had him by the collar and belt and slammed him up against the concrete wall. He bounced off and fell backward into the arms of two? three? a dozen? police officers who swarmed, tackled, pinned, and cuffed him.

  It was over. Boy, was it over!

  “You have the right to remain silent . . .” said one officer.

  Ted Canan looked up from the concrete to see a cop remove a wig and stocking cap, another cop holstering his gun, two campus police standing ready with night sticks, and the lone, uniformed orator reading him his rights.

  As for that wall that met him in the woods . . . it was a huge black man, standing over him with muscular arms crossed over his chest, smiling knowingly, just glaring at him like a lion eyeing his kill.

  “We got you, punk, and now you better sing!”

  THE PHONE RANG in Shannon’s dorm room. She got up from her desk where she’d been waiting and picked up the phone.

  “Shannon?” came the voice of a police officer.

  “Yes.”

  “We got him.”

  THE DISPATCHER’S VOICE: “Hello? Are you there?”

  A man’s voice, desperate, urgent: “Who is this? I need the phone—”

  “Sir, this is District Twelve Fire Emergency. We have dispatched Medic One and an aid unit to the governor’s residence. Who are you, sir?”

  “I’m Governor Slater! It’s my daughter!”

  “Is she conscious, sir?”

  “No, no, I don’t believe so.”

  “Is she breathing normally?”

  The governor calls off the phone, “Is she breathing? Ashley! Is she breathing?” A woman screams something in the background. The governor comes back on the phone.

  “She’s breathing, but we don’t think she’s conscious.”

  “Does it sound like she’s breathing normally?”

  “No . . . No, she’s gasping . . . It’s very labored breathing.”

  “Would you like to do CPR? I can help you.”

  “Yes! I just need to—”

  The woman shouts something. There are thumping sounds, doors opening, footsteps, voices. “Oh, they’re here! Thank God!”

  “The aid crew is there, sir?”

  “Yes!”

  “Very good, sir, they’ll take it from here, all right?”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  “Good-bye.”

  Click.

  The tape went silent. John hit the Stop button.

  Monday night, a little after 8 P.M.

  Detective Bob Henderson sat there on the edge of John’s easy chair and just stared blank-faced at the cassette player for a significant length of time. Finally, in as cool and efficient a tone of voice as he could muster, he asked John, “Is that one tape your only copy?”

  “I’ve made some others, and they’re in safekeeping,” John answered.

  Henderson went back to staring at the cassette player again, thinking, rubbing his chin,
his mouth. “Okay . . . so it’s just like Shannon DuPliese says—Hillary Slater died from an abortion.”

  Leslie answered directly, “That’s right.” No ifs, ands, or buts.

  Deanne reminded the detective, “She was there, Mr. Henderson. She saw it, and she’s ready to testify to it.”

  “I know,” said Henderson, “she told me on the phone. She even knows the false name Hillary used in case we need to subpoena the clinic records.”

  “And that’s why that Canan punk tried to kill her,” Max added. “She knew too much, and they were afraid she’d talk!”

  Henderson held up his hand. “Now, now, let’s not go too fast. Let’s get all the facts in hand before we jump to conclusions.”

  Max was quite ready for conclusions. “What more facts you need? John Barrett Sr. had that tape, and he got killed. Shannon DuPliese is the one talking on the tape, and somebody just tried to waste her on Saturday! You oughta be askin’ yourself who and why.”

  “I’m asking myself, qui bono?” said Henderson.

  “What’s that?” asked Max.

  “Who benefits?” Henderson stared at the floor and rubbed his face some more. “And listen, I really do not like the answer to that question. I’ve got to be really careful!” He pointed his finger right at John and then Leslie. “And you people in the media have to be careful too! Do you have any idea how explosive this is?”

  John shrugged. “That’s why we called you. We thought we finally had something you could run with.”

  Henderson only shook his head and whispered a mournful oath, followed by a quick “Excuse me.” He reviewed some facts in his head. “Well . . . Shannon is convinced the governor and his chief of staff were trying to hush her up—permanently. She says Devin was hounding her, trying to keep her quiet, and she told him she just might talk, and then—a few days later—here’s Canan jumping her—well, the decoy of her.”

  “So okay!” said Max. “There you are.”

  “Yeah, here I am—in a very sticky situation where I’d better be right, and I mean absolutely, totally right, before I make a move on this thing.” Henderson took a deep breath and switched from a dumbfounded to a methodical mode. “Well, we’ve got something started. I’ve been in touch with the police back at Midwestern University, and we’ve got a firm ID on Ted Canan. I know the guy. He’s from right around here, and he’s got a record as long as three of our arms. I’ve run him in a few times myself. So I think it’s fair to ask what a two-bit hood was doing clear over in the Midwest, attacking the only girl on that campus who just happened to be best friends with the governor’s dead daughter.” He looked at Leslie. “Now was it you that had that video . . . ?”