Piercing the Darkness

by Frank Peretti

  JUDY BALCOM STUCK her head into Don’s Wayside and called, “Mr. Hogan! Al Lemley’s on the phone!”

  Marshall got up from the counter, paid for his coffee, and hurried next door.

  Judy Balcom ran a tight little secretarial service, typing letters, making and answering calls, making copies, doing word processing, and relaying messages—to name just a few tasks—for many of the local businesses around the town. For a reasonable fee, she let Marshall call Al Lemley in New York, and now Lemley, true to his style, had wasted no time in finding what Marshall needed.

  “Hello from New York,” came that same East Coast voice.

  “Al, are you going to make me happy?”

  “No, buddy. I’m going to make you sick. Got the fax ready?”

  Judy was ready.

  Marshall gave Al the go-ahead.

  ALICE CONTINUED HER story. “Now, I didn’t even notice who was over in the lobby where all the mailboxes are. I never pay attention to that unless it’s someone I know. But all of a sudden I heard this commotion out there like some child was getting rowdy—you know, misbehaving, and I remember thinking, Now where are that child’s parents? They shouldn’t let her carry on so!

  “Well, Debbie was all finished with my package, so I went out into the lobby, and then I could see the whole thing. Here was this woman, just standing there in the middle of the lobby . . . She had some mail in her hand, so I guess she’d come to get her mail . . . And then, here was this little girl, this Amber, just screaming and shouting and . . . and prancing like she was a little horse, and that poor woman was just terrified!”

  THE FAX MACHINE started to hum and roll out some documents. Marshall picked each page up as it dropped into the bin. There were police reports similar to what he already had, and then there were some news articles from the local newspapers. One article carried another photo of Sally Roe, this time in handcuffs, in the custody of two uniformed officers.

  “AND WHAT THAT child said!” Alice exclaimed.

  “What did she say?” asked Kate.

  “She pranced, then she hit the woman, and she screamed, and just kept hitting the woman, and she was saying, ‘I know who you are! You killed your baby! You killed your baby!’ The poor woman was just terrified; you’d think she was being attacked by a vicious dog or something.

  “Well, finally the woman broke free and ran out the door like a scared rabbit. Amber ran after her as far as the door, still shouting at her, ‘You killed your baby! I know you! You killed your baby!’ Then Mrs. Brandon came out of the back room and grabbed her daughter and tried to pull her back inside, but she wouldn’t go with her mother, she wouldn’t go at all, and so they had a big tugging match right there in the lobby, right in front of me, and Mrs. Brandon was shouting, ‘Stop it, Amber! Stop that right now! No more of this!’”

  Kate asked, “Did Mrs. Brandon ever use the name Amethyst?”

  A light bulb went on in Alice’s head. “Why, yes! I do remember that! She was calling Amber Amber one minute, and Amethyst the next. She was saying, ‘Amethyst, Amethyst, you stop that now! You stop screaming and calm down!’ I didn’t understand what she meant; I thought it was just a nickname or something.”

  Another news article dropped out of the fax machine. Marshall skimmed it. Sally Roe had been arrested after police broke down the door of her motel room in Fairwood. Inside, they found Roe in the bathroom in a seemingly drugged stupor, and her infant daughter, less than two months old, drowned in the bathtub. Roe was subsequently charged with first-degree murder in the drowning death of her child.

  KATE COULD HARDLY wait to ask her next question. The incident in the Post Office could have been coincidence, but in a small town like this, that was unlikely. She dug in her briefcase and brought out the mug shots of Sally Roe, placing them before Alice. “Is this the woman you saw that day?”

  Alice’s eyes grew wide, and then she gave a slow, awestruck nod. “She looks so awful in this picture . . . but this is her. Sally Roe, huh?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Is she a criminal?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did she do?”

  “Well . . . she did kill someone.”

  MARSHALL WALKED SLOWLY to his car, got behind the wheel, and then just sat there for a long while, reading through the news articles and police reports Al Lemley had sent. It was fascinating stuff, full of potential leads, but also very, very tragic.

  “Tramp,” the prosecutors had called her. “Diabolical witch, self-centered, self-seeking, contemptible, child-killer.”

  The police report said that Sally Roe was soaking wet when she was found on the floor in the bathroom. The tub was overflowing. The child was in the tub, dead. She’d told the police at the time that she’d killed her baby, but when questioned later, claimed she had no recollection of what had happened.

  During the trial—and Marshall found this interesting—Sally seemed detached and unremorseful. “It was meant to be,” she said. “My higher self ordained this should happen. Rachel’s higher self wished to die at this time, and Jonas was there to carry it out. We all determine our own fates, our lot in life, when we are to die, and what destiny we are born into the next time. There is no death; there is only change.”

  Jonas. A spirit-guide, according to Sally. She admitted drowning the child at first, but later seemed to change her testimony by blaming her spirit-guide. “He took control,” she said, “and he did the drowning.”

  The jury didn’t buy it. They found her guilty, and Sally was later sentenced to thirty years in prison.

  As for the father of the child, he never came forward and was never found. Sally never identified him. She was simply portrayed as a tramp and her child as illegitimate.

  It all happened ten years ago.

  CHAPTER 22

  DRIP. DRIP. DRIP.

  The faucet seemed to mark off segments of time, announcing the passing of a moment, and another moment, and another moment, and another moment, like a clock, never stopping, never slowing—steady dripping, moments passing.

  Traffic flowed by outside the bathroom window, but Sally didn’t hear it. A siren wailed once, but she did not stir or take notice. She had no strength, no will to rise from her place there on the bathroom floor—her back against the pale blue wall, her hands limp upon her lap, her head resting against the hard plaster, but not turning away from the discomfort.

  She just sat there, staring vacantly at that tub, listening to the faucet drip, watching each drop build on the tip of the spout and then, stretching with weight, break free and disappear.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  “Ms. Roe, did you think there was no law higher than yourself?”

  “There is no higher reality, sir, than what I myself have created.”

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  “You honestly don’t recall picking up your child, holding her under the water, and drowning her?”

  “I told you before, I wasn’t there; it was Jonas.”

  “But you admitted drowning your daughter!”

  “Jonas performed the act. My higher self willed it, he carried it out . . .”

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  “We found the defendant in the bathroom . . . She seemed dazed . . .”

  “And what did she say to you?”

  “She said, ‘Oh no! I’ve killed my baby.’”

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  “. . . ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you have heard an account of the unthinkable . . . This vile creature, void of conscience, without remorse . . .”

  Void of conscience, without remorse. Void of conscience, without remorse. Void of conscience, without remorse.

  A child in an infinite yard with no fence. The creator and arbiter of all reality. The center of her own universe. No right, no wrong. Only self. I am all that matters.

  At least, that’s how it used to be.

  Sally shifted just a little. The hard linoleum floor reminded her of where she was: her glorious universe. Ye
s. A small, cold, echoing bathroom with a dripping bathtub faucet, inhabited by a murderer, a vagabond, a tramp, a failure, an empty jar drained steadily over ten years of pointless, aimless existence, a discarded piece of flesh nobody wanted.

  Now she sat on the linoleum, her head against the wall, her elbow resting on the toilet, beside the bathtub where she’d taken the life of her daughter.

  Her universe. Her destiny. Her truth.

  She had no tears. She was too empty to cry; there was no soul within her. She continued to breathe, but not because she wanted to. It just happened. Life just happened. She just happened, and she didn’t know why.

  The spirits had found her: Despair, Death, Insanity, and now Suicide. They dug at her, whispered to her, scratched away her soul one layer at a time. Murderer, they said. Worthless, guilty murderer! You can never do good! There’s nothing good in you! You can’t help anyone! Why don’t you give it all up?

  It’s lonely in this universe, she thought. It’s supposed to be my creation, but now I’m lost in it. I wish I could know something for sure. I wish I could find a fence at the end of this yard.

  Ah, but it is too late for that now.

  Her hand fell from her lap and thumped gently against the side of the tub.

  A fence.

  No, it wasn’t a big thought; it wasn’t a stirring idea, and it didn’t cause the slightest change in her breathing or pulse. It was just a notion, an inkling of a possibility, a simple proposition to toss around: this tub could be a fence.

  She looked at the tub; she touched the cold, blue-green porcelain. I could pretend, she thought. Just for the sake of discussion, I could pretend that this is a fence, a limitation, a boundary.

  A boundary I crossed over, and shouldn’t have.

  She let her thoughts continue on their own and just enjoyed listening to them huddle together and confer in her head.

  What if what happened here was wrong?

  Ah, come on, according to whom? There are no absolutes; you can’t know anything for sure.

  What if there are, and what if I can?

  But how?

  Later, later. Just answer the first question.

  What if it was wrong?

  Yeah.

  Then I’m guilty. I made a wrong choice, I jumped the boundary, I did wrong.

  But I thought boundaries exist only in your mind!

  I did wrong. I want to think that, just once.

  Why?

  Because I need a fence. Even if I’m on the wrong side of it, I need a fence. I need to be wrong. I need to be guilty.

  What for?

  Because . . .

  Sally stirred. She pressed her hand firmly against the side of the tub where her child had died. She mouthed the words, then she whispered them, then she said them out loud, “Because at least then I’d know where I am!”

  Apparently she’d awakened a dormant emotion; pain came upon her suddenly, an aching deep in her soul, and with gritted teeth and a stifled whimper, she pounded the side of the tub. “Oh, God!”

  She rested against the hard plaster wall again, panting in hurt, anger, and despair. “O God, help me!”

  Despair slipped and fell. His talons had lost their grip.

  There. She’d said it. She’d followed the proposition through to its conclusion, had her little fit, and now she was finished. She didn’t know if she felt better. She felt a little foolish for talking out loud to herself—or to God, whatever the case may be. It didn’t matter.

  For some reason she felt a weight around her neck, against her chest. Her hand went to the ring hanging there. She pulled it out and looked at it again. The ugly little gargoyle bared its teeth at her.

  And then a memory hit her. It hit her so hard and so suddenly that she was amazed it had stayed hidden so long.

  “The ring! Owen’s ring!”

  IRENE BLEDSOE WAS visibly uncomfortable. “Mr. Harris, your friends will have to remain here.”

  Under the circumstances, Tom never felt better. He was sitting on the same hard wooden bench in the same cold, echoing, marble hallway in the courthouse in Claytonville; he was here for another prearranged visit with his children, and once again Irene Bledsoe was in charge.

  But this time he was flanked by . . .

  “Mrs. Bledsoe, this is my pastor, Mark Howard, and my attorney, Wayne Corrigan.”

  Both men offered their hands, and she shook them out of necessity, but she was not entirely cordial. “Hello. As I said, Mr. Harris will only be allowed to see his children alone.”

  Corrigan was in great form. “We are here upon Mr. Harris’s invitation, and we will accompany him during his visitation. If you refuse to allow it, you’ll be required to appear in court to show just cause.” Then he smiled.

  Bledsoe was indignant and actually had to search for her words. “You . . . This is . . . this is a private meeting! Mr. Harris must see his children alone!”

  “Then I’m sure you’ll be happy to remain here with us while he does so?”

  “That’s not what I meant and you know it! The visitation is to be between Mr. Harris and his children with a social worker in attendance.”

  “Meaning yourself?”

  “Of course!”

  Corrigan got out his notepad. “By whose order?”

  She stalled. “I’d . . . I’d have to look it up.”

  “If it’s all the same to you,” said Tom, “I’d like to see my kids. They’re waiting for me, aren’t they?”

  “One moment,” she said with a raise of her hand. “Have you brought the questionnaires I sent you?”

  Corrigan had something to say about that as well. “In light of the pending civil suit, I’ve advised my client to defer filling out any psychological surveys or other tests for the time being.”

  Her answer was cold and threatening. “You do realize, of course, that this will delay our releasing the children back to Mr. Harris’s custody?”

  “According to CPD records, you’ve never released any children back to their parents without first having a trial anyway, so at the moment we’re resigned to that. Now, if we could proceed with the visitation?”

  She gave in. “All right. Won’t you follow me?”

  She started walking toward the big marble staircase again, the pock, pock, pock of her heels echoing through the hall as an announcement of her authority, and perhaps an expression of her indignity as well. They reached the second floor, went through the big, uninviting door and into the antechamber where John the guard was stationed once again. He seemed a little surprised to see three men instead of just one, but since they came in with Bledsoe, he figured it must be okay.

  “Hi, kids!”

  With cries of delight, Ruth and Josiah ran to their father. Tom dropped to one knee to embrace them, and for some reason Irene Bledsoe did not come between them. Josiah was really tickled to see his dad again; Ruth just started crying and wouldn’t let go of him. All the hugs went on for quite some time.

  “Poor, abused kids,” Corrigan whispered to Mark.

  Bledsoe took her seat at the end of the table and offered chairs to Mark and Corrigan. They sat down quietly on Tom’s side of the table.

  “Okay, kids,” Tom said finally. “Go ahead and sit down.”

  They went to their chairs on the other side of the table, and just then noticed Mark. “Hi, Pastor Howard.”

  “Hi. How are you?”

  “Okay.”

  “We have forty minutes,” Bledsoe said, mostly to remind everyone that she was still in charge.

  For the next thirty minutes Tom visited with his kids, getting caught up on mostly trivial matters. The kids were trying to read more, and seemed to be getting along better with the other kids in the foster home, although Tom couldn’t be sure if it was the same foster home as last time. They weren’t doing any schoolwork, though, which meant they would have some catching up to do during the summer, if that happened at all. Ruth’s bump had healed well and was barely visible.

  But
as the time grew shorter, there was one thing Tom knew he must do before leaving, while he still had the chance. Above all else, he knew he must pray with his kids.

  “Hey, Daddy has to go pretty soon, so let’s pray together.”

  He reached across the table and took their hands. They were a family again, just for that moment, and he was the spiritual head, the leader and example he was meant to be.

  “Dear Lord, I just pray now for my children, and I ask You to place a hedge of protection around them. Protect their hearts and their minds, and may they never doubt that You love them and that they are in Your hands. Help them to always be good kids and live the way You want them to. I pray, dear Father, that we will all be together again.”

  Mark and Corrigan joined in the prayer, and listened as little Ruth prayed for her daddy and her brother, and even for Mrs. Bledsoe. Then Josiah prayed, declaring his love for Jesus and his desire to be a good child of God.

  None of this was an accident. They were doing battle in this room, for even though the state might erect insurmountable walls of red tape around these children, the prayer of each child, offered in simple faith, would be enough to tear the walls down. This was where the victory would begin. They all knew it, and as the kids prayed, they could feel it.

  “Amen,” said Josiah.

  “Amen,” they all said—all except for Irene Bledsoe.

  It was almost time to go. Tom opened a paper sack. “Here. I meant to give these to you last time.”

  “Hey, all right!” said Josiah, receiving his Bible.

  “Thank you, Daddy!” said Ruth, hugging hers to her chest.

  Tom also brought them some of their favorite books and the stationery they didn’t receive the last time. He could see Irene Bledsoe eyeing everything he brought out of the sack, but he proceeded slowly and openly, having nothing to hide.