by Tim LaHaye
Rayford concocted a story he believed would be convincing. The only problem, he knew, was that it might not be long before Buck was identified as his impostor.
CHAPTER 18
Before returning to Dallas, Rayford hoped to find out what Leon knew or believed had happened in Denver. But he was unable to reach Mac. Was it possible Buck had been recognized? No one would believe Rayford had not had a part in Hattie’s escape if it was known his son-in-law was there. Rayford would accept the consequences of his actions in what he considered a holy war. He did, however, want to stay out of prison long enough to find Amanda and clear her name.
If Tsion was right, the 144,000 witnesses were sealed by God and protected from harm for a certain period. Though he was not one of the witnesses, Rayford was a believer; he had the mark of God on his forehead, and he trusted God to protect him. If God did not, then, as the apostle Paul put it, to die would be “gain.”
Rayford had not heard from Mac and couldn’t raise him. Either Mac could not get away from Leon long enough to get in touch with him, or something was wrong on the ground. Rayford had to do something. If he was to say he had aborted his mission, it only made sense to radio Leon before showing up again in Dallas.
Buck was rocked to think he might have killed someone. When Dr. Charles met them at Waukegan Airport before following them to Mt. Prospect, Buck whispered his fear. “I have to know how bad I hurt that guard.”
“I know a guy at the GC emergency facility outside Littleton,” Dr. Charles said. “I can find out.”
Dr. Charles stayed in his car on the phone after Ken wheeled the Suburban into the backyard. Chloe and Tsion demanded every detail. Chloe navigated the stairs with her cane, insisting that Hattie take the downstairs bed. Hattie looked exhausted. Ken and Tsion helped her up the stairs and urged her to call for them after her shower so they could help her back down.
Buck and Chloe spoke in private. “You could have been killed,” she said.
“I’m surprised I wasn’t. I just know I killed that guard. I can’t believe it. But he had just murdered the receptionist, and I knew he would do the same to us. I reacted instinctively. If I’d thought about it, I might have frozen.”
“There was nothing else you could do, Buck. But you can’t kill a man with a punch, can you?”
“I hope not. But he had spun around and was moving right toward me when I hit him. I’m not exaggerating, hon. I don’t think I could have hit him harder if I had been running at him. It felt as if my fist was inside his head. Everything crumbled beneath it, and he landed flush on the back of his head. It sounded like a bomb.”
“It was self-defense, Buck.”
“I don’t know what I’ll do if I find out he’s dead.”
“What will the Global Community do if they find out it was you?”
Buck wondered how long that might take. The young guard had gotten a good look at him, but he was likely dead. The other guard assumed he was Rayford Steele. Until someone showed him a picture of Rayford, he might still believe it. But could he describe Buck?
Buck moved to a mirror in the hallway. His face was grimy, his cheek red and purple almost to his nose. His hair was wild and dark with sweat. He needed a shower. But what had he looked like at that clinic? What might the surviving guard say about him?
“Charlie Tango to Dallas tower, over.”
“Tower, go ahead, Charlie Tango.”
“Relay urgent message to Global Community Supreme Commander. Mission aborted due to mechanical failure. Checking equipment before return to base. ETA two hours, over.”
“Roger that, Charlie Tango.”
Rayford put down at an unattended and seemingly abandoned airstrip east of Amarillo and waited for Leon Fortunato’s call.
Buck worried when Dr. Charles finally came into the house and would not make eye contact. The doctor agreed to check Chloe, Ken, and Hattie before heading back to Kenosha. He appeared most concerned about Hattie and her baby. She was to remain at rest for other than nature calls. He told the others how to care for her and what symptoms to monitor.
The doctor removed Ken’s stitches and advised him also to take it easy for several days.
“What, no more shoot-outs? Guess I can’t work for Buck for a while.”
The doctor told Chloe again that time was her ally. Her arm and foot casts were not ready to be removed, but he prescribed therapy that would help her snap back more quickly.
Buck waited, watching. If Dr. Charles ignored him altogether, that meant Buck had killed a man and the doctor didn’t know how to tell him. “Could you check my cheek?” Buck asked.
Without a word, Dr. Charles approached. He held Buck’s face in his hands and turned him this way and that in the light. “I need to clean that,” he said. “You risk infection unless we get some alcohol in there.”
The others left them while the doctor worked on Buck. “You’ll feel better after a shower, too,” he said.
“I’ll feel better when you tell me what you found out. You were on that phone a long time.”
“The man is dead,” Dr. Charles said.
Buck stared.
“I don’t see that you had any choice, Buck.”
“They’ll come looking for me. They had cameras throughout that place.”
“If you looked like you look now, even people who know you might not have recognized you.”
“I have to turn myself in.”
Dr. Charles stepped back. “If you shot an enemy soldier during a battle, would you turn yourself in?”
“I didn’t mean to kill him.”
“But if you had not, he would have killed you. He killed someone right in front of you. You know his assignment was to take out both you and Hattie.”
“How did a punch kill him?”
The doctor applied a butterfly bandage and sat on the table. “My colleague in Littleton tells me that either of the two blows—to the face or to the back of the head—could have done it. But the combination made it unavoidable. The guard suffered severe facial trauma, a shattering of cartilage and bone around the nose, some of it driven into his skull. Both optic nerves were destroyed. Several teeth were shattered, and the upper jaw cracked. That damage alone might have killed him.”
“Might have?”
“My associate leans toward the posterior cranial damage as the cause of death. The back of his head hitting flush on the floor caused his skull to shatter like an eggshell. Several shards of cranial tissue were embedded in the brain. He died instantly.”
Buck hung his head. What kind of a soldier was he? How could he be expected to fight in this cosmic battle of good versus evil if he couldn’t handle killing the enemy?
The doctor began putting his things away. “I’ve never met anyone who caused another person’s death and didn’t feel awful for a while,” he said. “I’ve talked with parents who killed someone while protecting their own child, but still they were haunted and sobered. Ask yourself where Hattie would be if not for what you did. Where would you be?”
“I’d be in heaven. Hattie would be in hell.”
“Then you bought her some time.”
Rayford finally received a call from the Dallas tower, asking that he inform them when he was half an hour from touchdown. “The Supreme Commander awaits your arrival.”
He told them he was about to get underway. Half an hour out of Dallas, he radioed in, and forty minutes later he taxied to the hangar that also housed the Condor 216. He alighted to face a glowering Leon Fortunato, Mac McCullum behind him with a knowing look. Rayford couldn’t wait to talk to Mac privately.
“What happened, Captain Steele?”
“It was sluggish, Commander, and only prudent to check it out. I was able to make an adjustment, but I was so far behind schedule I thought I’d better check in.”
“You don’t know what happened, then?”
“To the plane? Not entirely, but it was unstable and—”
“I mean what happened in Denver!”
>
Rayford glanced at Mac, who almost imperceptibly shook his head.
“In Denver?”
“I told you, Commander,” Mac said, “I was unable to reach him.”
“Follow me,” Fortunato said. He led Rayford and Mac to an office, where he punched up on a computer a video and text e-mail from the Global Community office in Denver. The three bent over the monitor and watched as Fortunato narrated. “We knew Miss Durham was unwilling to return to New Babylon, but His Excellency believed it was in her best interest and in the best interest of global security. To protect his fiancée and their child, we assigned two security officers to meet with you and her and to give you your orders. Their top priority was the transfer of Miss Durham to you for her transport to the Middle East. They were to ensure she was still in Denver when you arrived.
“While the laboratory and clinic there were largely undamaged by the earthquake, we thought the surveillance system had been knocked out. However, the surviving security officer double-checked the system, just in case, and found a view of the impostor.”
“The impostor?” Rayford said.
“The man claiming to be you.”
Rayford raised his eyebrows.
“These were professionals, Captain Steele.”
“These?”
“At least two. Maybe more. The cameras in front of the building and in the reception area were not operating. There are cameras at either end of the main corridor and one in the middle. The action you’ll see here took place in the middle, but the only camera working was the one at the north end of the corridor. Nearly every view of the impostor is blocked by one of the security men, or the impostor has his back to the camera. The tape begins here with the security guards and the perpetrator stepping outside Miss Durham’s door while she dressed for the trip.”
It was clear Buck was the man between the two guards, but his face was indistinct. His hair was out of place, and he had an ugly cheek wound.
“Now watch, gentlemen. When the senior guard knocks on Miss Durham’s door, the other also turns toward the door, but the perp glances down the hall. That’s the clearest view we get of his face.”
Again, Rayford was relieved that the image was not clear.
“The senior guard believes the perp was distracted by two janitors who appear earlier on the tape. He will interview them later today. Now here, a few moments later, he has lost patience with Miss Durham. He calls to her and both guards bang on the door. Here the junior guard orders curious patients back into their rooms. The perp backs up a couple of steps when the senior guard blows open the door. That brings the receptionist. While the junior guard is distracted, the perp somehow disarms him, and see? See the gunfire? He murders the receptionist where she stands. When the junior guard attempts to disarm him, he drives the butt end of the Uzi so hard into his face that the guard is dead before he hits the floor.
Mac and Rayford caught each other’s eyes and leaned closer to study the video. Rayford wondered if Fortunato thought he had the power Carpathia possessed, to convince people they had seen something they had not. He couldn’t let it pass.
“That’s not what I see there, Leon.”
Leon looked sharply at him. “What are you saying?”
“The junior guard did the firing.” Fortunato backed up the tape. “See?” Rayford said. “There! He’s firing. The perp is stepping back. The guard wheels back around, and the perp steps forward as the guard appears to slip on his own expelled shell casings. See? He has no footing, so the blow drives his head to the floor.”
Fortunato looked angry. He reran the video a couple more times.
Mac said, “The perp didn’t even attempt to grab the gun.”
“Say what you will, gentlemen, but that impostor murdered the receptionist and the guard.”
“The guard?” Rayford said. “He might have fallen on his head even if he hadn’t been punched.”
“Anyway,” Fortunato continued, “the accomplice pulled Miss Durham through the window and sent her to the getaway car. As soon as the senior guard opened the door, the accomplice fired at him.”
That was not, of course, the way Rayford had heard it. “How did he escape being killed?”
“He nearly was. He has a severe wound to his heel.”
“I thought you said he was coming into the room when he was fired upon?”
“Correct.”
“He was running out of the room if he got shot in the heel.”
The computer beeped, and Fortunato asked an aide for help. “Another message is coming in,” he said. “Bring it up for me.”
The aide hit a few buttons, and a new message flashed from the senior guard. It read, “Foot being treated. Surgery required. Accomplice was second janitor in first scene on tape. Real janitor found with wad of cash. Says accomplice forced on him to appear like bribe. Says accomplice held knife to throat until he got information.”
Fortunato’s aide backed the video all the way to where the two janitors entered the hallway and walked toward the camera. Rayford, who had never met Ritz, guessed which one he was only by his incomplete janitorial outfit. The only thing resembling a uniform was the cap he had apparently borrowed from the janitor. He carried a broom, but his clothing was western.
“He could be from that area,” Fortunato said.
“Good call,” Rayford said.
“Well, it doesn’t take a trained eye to identify regional clothing.”
“Still, Commander, that’s an insightful catch.”
“I don’t see a knife,” Mac said, as the figures neared the camera. Ritz’s cap was pulled low over his eyes. Rayford held his breath as he reached for the bill of his cap. He lifted it and reset it on his head, showing his face more clearly. Rayford and Mac looked at each other behind Fortunato.
“After they passed that camera,” Fortunato said, “the accomplice got the information he needed and ran the janitor off. He absconded with Miss Durham and opened fire on our guard. And those guards were there only to protect Miss Durham.”
The guard had conveniently left out details that would have made him appear an idiot. Until someone could thoroughly investigate the scene, the Global Community had not a shred of evidence implicating Rayford.
“She will contact you,” Fortunato said. “She always does. You had better not have had anything to do with this. His Excellency would consider that high treason and punishable by death.”
“You suspect me?”
“I have come to no conclusions.”
“Am I returning to New Babylon as a suspect or as a pilot?”
“A pilot, of course.”
“You want me at the controls of the Condor 216?”
“Of course. You can’t kill us without killing yourself, and I don’t gauge you suicidal. Yet.”
Buck spent more than three weeks working on the Internet version of Global Community Weekly. He was in touch with Carpathia nearly every day. Nothing was said about Hattie Durham, but Carpathia often reminded Buck that their mutual “friend,” Rabbi Tsion Ben-Judah, would be protected by the Global Community anytime he chose to return to the Holy Land. Buck did not tell Tsion. He merely kept alive his promise that the rabbi could return to Israel within the month.
Donny Moore’s duplex proved more ideal every day. Nothing else in the neighborhood had survived. Virtually no traffic came by.
Ken Ritz, now fully on the mend, moved out of the tiny sliver of the Quonset hut he had been allotted at Palwaukee and commuted between Wheeling and Waukegan from his new digs in the basement of the safe house. Dr. Charles visited every few days, and every chance they got, the Tribulation Force met together and sat under Tsion’s teaching.
It was no accident that they met around the kitchen table with Hattie not eight feet away on her sickbed. Often she rolled onto her side with her back to them, pretending to sleep, but Buck was convinced she heard every word.
They were careful not to say anything that might incriminate them with Carpathia, having no id
ea what the future held for Nicolae and Hattie. But they cried together, prayed together, laughed, sang, studied, and shared their stories. Dr. Charles was often present.
Tsion rehearsed the entire plan of salvation in nearly every meeting. It might come in the form of one of their stories or his simply expositing a Scripture passage. Hattie had lots of questions, but she asked them only of Chloe later.
The Tribulation Force wanted Dr. Charles to become a full-fledged member, but he declined, fearful that more frequent daily trips to the house might lead the wrong people there. Ritz spent many days tinkering in the underground shelter, getting it into shape in case any or all of them needed complete seclusion. They hoped it would not come to that.
The flight from Dallas to New Babylon, with several stops to pick up Carpathia’s regional ambassadors, had been a harrowing one for Rayford. He and Mac both worried that Fortunato might enlist Mac to eliminate him. Rayford felt vulnerable, assuming Fortunato believed he was involved in the rescue of Hattie Durham.
The device that allowed Rayford to hear what was going on in the main cabin yielded fascinating listening throughout the trip. One of the strategically placed transmitters was near the seat usually occupied by Nicolae Carpathia himself. Of course, Leon had appropriated that one, which was propitious for Rayford. He found Leon an incredible master of deceit, second only to Nicolae.
Each ambassador came aboard with attendant fanfare, and Fortunato immediately ingratiated himself. He ordered the cabin crew to wait on them, whispered to them, flattered them, took them into his confidence. Each heard Fortunato’s tale of having been raised from the dead by Carpathia. It sounded to Rayford as if each was either truly impressed or put on a good front. “I assume you know that you’re among His Excellency’s favorite two regional potentates,” Fortunato privately told each king.
Their responses were variations of “I didn’t know for sure, but I can’t say it surprises me. I am most supportive of His Excellency’s regime.”