Mystery: The Sam Prichard Series - Books 5-8

by David Archer

  “The story is found in Genesis Chapter four, verses one through sixteen. It's the story of Cain and Abel, which I'm sure you've already figured out. I want to read it to you from Scripture, first. I'm not going to bother with the verse numbers, but we're starting with verse one, for those who want to follow along in your bibles.

  “Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, "I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD." And again, she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a tiller of the ground. In the course of time, Cain brought to the LORD an offering of the fruit of the ground, and Abel brought of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat portions. And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell. The LORD said to Cain, 'Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is couching at the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it.'

  “Cain said to Abel his brother, 'Let us go out to the field.' And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and killed him.

  “Then the LORD said to Cain, 'Where is Abel your brother?' He said, 'I do not know; am I my brother's keeper?' And the LORD said, 'What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground. And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you till the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength; you shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.'

  “Cain said to the LORD, 'My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, you have driven me this day away from the ground; and from your face I shall be hidden; and I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will slay me.' Then the LORD said to him, 'Not so! If any one slays Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.' And the LORD put a mark on Cain, lest any who came upon him should kill him.

  “Then Cain went away from the presence of the LORD, and dwelt in the land of Nod, east of Eden.

  “Now, even though this story does contain a murder, I want you to understand that it is not a story about the crime of murder. I think we need to be cautious not to let ourselves get sidetracked into talking about the right and wrong that pertains to murder. I’ve never murdered anyone, and I doubt that any of you have, either. If we're only going to talk about murder, then this story won't apply to you or me, and we can all go on home right now.

  “I'd say this is more like a story about a person who, as we've just seen, became a murderer, but it's really a lot more than that. In truth, it's a story about God. That shouldn't be too big a surprise, since that’s what most of the Bible is: it's the story of God.

  “But here's the kicker. Whether I like it or not, this is also a story about me. And whether you like it or not, my friends, it’s also a story about you.

  “Let's look again at this story. Verse one says, Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, 'I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD.' And then Verse two: And again, she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a tiller of the ground.

  “The story begins pretty simply. We've got two brothers who are born, the very first brothers ever to be born in the whole world. Brothers. I guess it could just as easily have been sisters, but God tends to pick on the males. Throughout the Bible, we find stories about brothers, and brothers don’t always do very well in Scripture. It seems like they're always in some kind of conflict, especially in the book of Genesis. Think about Jacob and Esau, Isaac and Ishmael, Shem and Ham, even Joseph and his brothers.

  “I guess it would be nice to be an only son, to have your Father’s affection all to yourself, but your brother is always right beside you, always there. As Christians, we are called upon to worship God, and to share His abiding, unlimited, unconditional love with our brothers. And that’s where the problems come in. You see, we can handle loving and worshiping God on our own, but that brother of ours? Sooner or later, your brother is the one who complicates things, because—get this—God loves Him just as much as He loves me. And if I'm going to be honest about it, then I might start to wonder if the Father loves him maybe just a little bit more than He loves me.

  “Now, the brothers in this story have their differences, as most brothers do: one of them is a shepherd, and one's a farmer. In this country, it wouldn't be hard to make this a story about the struggles of race, or of social classes. But that’s not what this story is about.

  “These brothers are close; they may even have been twins. Note that the passage says Eve conceived Cain, and bore him, but there is no mention of conceiving Abel; it only says that she also bore him. Whether or not they were twins isn't important, though; it's only important that they were brothers.

  “Verse three: In the course of time Cain brought to the LORD an offering of the fruit of the ground. And Verse four: and Abel brought of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat portions. And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering. And Verse five: but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell.

  “Both of the brothers brought offerings to lay before God. Both of them bring what they've got. What they're doing is acknowledging that God is the One Who gives both the crops and the livestock. They have both come to do as they ought to do, to worship God. When they get there, to whatever they might have used for an altar, God accepts Abel’s offering.

  “But he rejects Cain’s. From the rest of this story, we can see that Cain was angry! He was jealous, because God favored his brother over him! Cain was the eldest, and in all of the Old Testament, we learn that the eldest is the one with the Birthright, he's the one who inherits the larger share, he's the one who becomes head of the family or the clan when his father passes away.

  “And yet, in this story, God rejected the elder, and favored the younger. In his anger, Cain did the unthinkable; he rose up and murdered his own brother! He committed a sin, and then, when God confronted him about it, he even tried to lie his way out of it! He actually tried to convince God that he didn't know what God was talking about!”

  Porter closed the Bible in front of him. “I wonder how many here have ever tried to lie our way out of something with our parents.” He raised his own hand. “I know I did, anyone else?”

  Sam looked around the room and saw several hands go up, then looked at Indie and grinned as he raised his own. A second later, he saw her raise her own, and she grinned back.

  “Of course we did! We were children, and like children, we knew that if Momma or Poppa found out for sure what we'd done, we were going to get a whoopin'! An Amen'll fit there!”

  A dozen people called out, “Amen, Preacher!”

  “Now—I wonder how many of us have tried to do what Cain did, and lie our way out of it with God? Ever have those thoughts going through the back of your mind, the ones that say, 'well, it wasn't my fault,' or 'I don't know what made me do that, but I couldn't help it,' any of those things? Sure you have, we all have; that's Satan's best trick, his ability to get us to convince ourselves that the sin we commit isn't our fault at all! When we believe that lie, then it's hard for us to accept that we've done wrong, and so we're reluctant to confess that sin to God, to ask forgiveness—and if we don't, then Satan's won. He's gotten us to put the biggest wall up between us and God that we can, just by refusing to accept our guilt and acknowledge our responsibility, and accept the free gift of forgiveness that God gave us when His Son died on that cross in our place.

  “See? I told you the story wasn't really about murder. It's about the refusal of human nature to accept responsibility for our own actions, about our natural desire to avoid guilt, even if it means we pass up the free forgiveness that God has offered to each and every one of us.”

  He took out a handkerchief and wiped the sweat from his face. “Today, we're all saddened, because one of our n
umber has been found out as a murderer. There is enough evidence now to make it certain that he's been committing these atrocious crimes for many years, and has only now been found out. He was discovered by the work of a man I consider a local hero, because he challenged that man to stop him, and he's well on his way to doing just that, I believe. And I also believe that the reason he made that challenge is because he reached a point of knowing he could no longer lie to God, and say, 'this isn’t my fault.' He has reached a point of knowing that what he's doing is wrong, and I believe that the Holy Spirit has convicted him with the desire to make it stop, to make it end!

  “But don't leave here tonight thinking, 'I'm just thankful that it was him, and not me.' Brothers and Sisters, God is not one to regard one sin as greater than another! If there is sin in your life, and you’re trying to lie your way out of it, if you're refusing that responsibility, then you are refusing the conviction of the Holy Spirit, and I would that you would come to realize that before it's too late! If you refuse this gift that God has offered, the alternative may be an eternity in Hell! Please don't...”

  Sam yawned, and as he did, he turned his head and put a hand over his mouth politely, trying to hide the fact that he was yawning at all. If he had fought it off for another minute, it would have been too late. He happened to face the back of the church for just a second, and when he opened his eyes after the yawn, he was still looking at the back of the room, and there was a man there, a big, fat man, sitting all by himself.

  Sam noticed he was pointing at the preacher, and then he realized that he wasn't pointing, he was aiming a gun…

  Without thinking about what he was doing, Sam snatched a hymnal from the rack on the back of the pew in front of him and threw it at the man as hard as he could. It missed, but when it hit a woman in front of the fat man, it got his attention, and he turned to face Sam, and even through the mask and makeup, Sam knew it had to be Darrell Unger.

  The woman screamed in surprise, and everyone turned to see what was going on, as Unger stood and aimed again at Porter, but Sam was on his feet and moving. “Unger!” he shouted, and suddenly people were up and on their feet, many of them running and screaming, and the two deacons who were sitting closest to Porter leaped up and grabbed him, shielding him with their own bodies. Unger turned and looked at Sam again, and raised his gun, the big single-shot pistol that Indie had suspected it to be, and he fired once and then turned and ran out the doors into the hallway. Sam ran as fast as he could, hobbling on his bad hip, but by the time he got to the hallway there was no sign of the killer.

  Sam went back into the sanctuary to find Indie, and saw a crowd of people around where he'd been sitting, and a cold fist grabbed hold of his heart. He shoved his way in, and when he saw Indie lying on the pew they'd been sitting on, blood all around her head, he screamed, and then people were holding onto him, keeping him back. A man pushed past him, saying that he was a doctor, but Sam knew there would be no hope, and he wept, his sobs coming from somewhere so far down inside himself that he was having trouble even breathing.

  He was pushed down onto a pew, and then someone was holding him and praying in his ear, and he vaguely realized that it was Reverend Porter holding him. How long they sat there, he didn't know; it must have been only minutes, but it seemed like hours later that paramedics were rushing in, and the crowd around Indie parted to let them through.

  Sam tried to get up again, tried to go to her, but Porter and another man held him back, urging him to let the paramedics do their jobs, and he collapsed again in grief and resignation. He'd seen what Unger was capable of, he knew that a shot from that gun would be fatal, it had to be…

  The paramedics had her on a stretcher, and they were wheeling her out, and Sam saw that her face wasn't covered. There was a mask over her face, and a lot of gauze wrapped around her head, and he felt the first glimmer of hope.

  A man came to him and said that they were taking her to the hospital, and that he could ride along with her.

  “I, um—I've got to get my daughter...”

  “My wife is going to get her, Sam,” Porter said, “and we'll bring her to the hospital. You go with your wife, we'll be right there, I promise you. Go!”

  Sam felt hands helping him up, and he followed the stretcher. One of the paramedics helped him into the ambulance after they got Indie inside it, and he sat there beside her, looking at her face. It was still covered with blood, and Sam began to wonder how he was going to tell Kenzie that Mommy was gone, how he would cope with her all alone.

  They got to the hospital, and Indie was rushed into the ER. Someone led Sam to the desk, and somehow he managed to give them his insurance information, and then they put him into a small room to wait. Porter and his wife came in with Kenzie, and she crawled up onto his lap.

  “Daddy? They said Mommy got hurt?” she asked, and Sam began to weep as he led her.

  “Yeah,” he said. “There was a bad man at church, and he hurt Mommy. She's in with the doctors now, Sweetie.”

  “Did she get shot like you did?”

  Sam nodded. “Yes, Sweetheart, Mommy got shot. She's hurt pretty bad...”

  “Mr. Prichard?” someone was saying, and he looked up into the face of a man he didn't know. “Mr. Prichard, your wife is going to be alright. She's been hurt, yes, but it's not life threatening. The bullet went across the side of her head, and she's bled a lot, but she'll be okay. I'm Doctor Elkhart, I'm a surgeon at the hospital, here, sir, and she's going to be fine. We just took her to get some X-rays, but from what we can tell, she's just been grazed and it knocked her out. She's awake, if you want to come and talk to her when she comes back. You can bring your daughter, too. Come on, I'll show you to her room.”

  Sam stared at the doctor, but Kenzie was off his lap and tugging on his hand, so he got to his feet and followed. The doctor led them to a room off the ER, and Sam sat down in a chair to wait for Indie to be brought back from her X-rays, with Kenzie in his lap once again.

  A moment later, a nurse wheeled Indie in, and Sam stared. She was sitting up on the bed, with the back of it raised, and her head wrapped in bandages and gauze. She was smiling, though he could tell they'd given her something potent for pain; her smile was lopsided, and when she saw Sam and Kenzie, she began to giggle and stretched out her arms.

  Kenzie didn't hesitate; she was off Sam's lap as soon as the bed stopped moving, climbing up onto it beside her mother, and then Sam was on his feet and beside the bed. He looked down at her and a sense of peace and wonder came over him.

  She'd survived. Somehow, Indie had survived the shot that had already killed dozens of people. Porter had told him that no one else had been injured, so the bullet had only grazed her head, and then must have ended up in a wall somewhere.

  “Hey, Ba-a-aby,” Indie said, stretching it out flirtatiously. “They said I'm gonna be Ooooo-Kaaaay!”

  Sam wept, but they were tears of happiness. He leaned down and wrapped her in his arms, and held her close, enfolding Kenzie into the family hug, as well.

  “Oh, Indie,” he said. “I thought I'd lost you.”

  “Hm-mm,” she said, “you can't get rid of me that easy! You're stuck with me, Buster!”

  “Mommy,” Kenzie said, “you got shot!”

  “I know,” Indie said to her, smiling. “Now I'm like Daddy, huh? I got shot!”

  Sam couldn't stop the grin. He knew that when those painkillers wore off, Indie was going to be in an entirely different mood!

  “I don't like it when you and Daddy get shot, Mommy!” Kenzie said seriously. “It's gotta stop!”

  “I agree with Kenzie,” Sam said. “It's gotta stop.”

  Doctor Elkhart was standing by and smiling at the exchange, but then he touched Sam on the elbow. “Just to bore you with the specifics, your wife has suffered a non-penetrating head wound, and while she did lose some blood, it's not enough to cause her any harm. The bullet clipped her just above her left ear, and in fact it entered the skin there and made a sma
ll tunnel under it, exiting the skin about an inch behind the ear. It didn't do any serious damage to anything other than skin and underlying tissues, although she's likely to have a mild headache for the next few days. I don't anticipate any kind of long-term effects.”

  Sam nodded. “What about, like, medications and such?”

  “Oh, I'll give her something for the pain, and she'll need antibiotics for about a week, just to make sure we fight off any infection the bullet might have carried along with it. Other than that headache, she should be able to get back to normal within a day or so, and even that should pass within three or four days.”

  Sam thanked the doctor, who smiled and left them alone. He turned back to Indie, and said, “You hear that? He said I have to let you take it easy for a few days.”

  “Ah, what does he know?” Indie said. “I'm ready to go home now, take me home and let's make dinner.”

  Sam chuckled in spite of himself. “I don't think you're quite up to cooking yet, Babe,” he said.

  There was a sound at the door, and Sam turned to find Karen Parks standing there. She crooked a finger at him and he nodded, holding up a finger to tell her he would be a minute, then turned back to Indie.

  “Baby, the cops are here, and I've got to go and talk to them. I'll be back in a few minutes, okay?”

  “Okay,” she said, “but gimme a kiss!”

  Sam smiled and complied, kissing her gently on the lips. “Be right back,” he said, before heading out to where Karen was waiting. They walked down the hall a bit, to get away from the door.

  “I heard she's gonna be alright?” Karen asked, and Sam nodded.

  “Yeah. Doc said it just grazed the side of her head, knocked her out. God, Karen, there was so much blood, I thought he'd killed her for certain!”