Fall On Your Knees

by Mary C. Findley

  She parked in the driveway, assuming his car must be inside the closed-up garage. Walking up the sidewalk, she began to softly sing, "Fall … on your knees … oh, hear … the angel voices …"

  The front door swung partway ajar in the wind that had kicked up, and snowflakes swirled into the darkened foyer. Karin halted and stared at the open door. The song died in her throat and she drew back in panic. This house stood apart, at the end of the street, on its own wooded lot. Inside, she heard strange sounds – splashing and scuffling. Voices – muffled – she heard those too. Whoever was in the house, it wasn’t any kind of welcoming committee.

  She realized belatedly that her cell phone had to be locked in the car. Keys! She dug frantically in her purse. No keys. She had to assume they were also locked in the car.

  Terror almost overwhelmed her as she reached the inescapable conclusion that voices were uttering threats beyond that door – that someone was undergoing some kind of attack. The splashing didn’t make sense, but the words she could catch included obscenities and "– kill you."

  If she ran to the nearest neighbor, she wasn’t at all sure whoever was being attacked would survive long enough for her to get help. Breathing prayers, she slipped into the house, leaving her high heels on the threshold.

  Five

  Murali shivered in the raw air of the unheated house, his hands duct-taped behind him, a sodden, breath-stealing hood on his head, near-frozen from the repeated dunking in the tub full of icy water. He was long past trying to puzzle out how these people had discovered his rental house. He could no longer try to reason out who they really were or what they would do with the information they demanded from him – the intel from his last assignment.

  One thought consumed him. How much time had passed since he had let himself into the house, only to be stupidly overpowered and bound? Periods of lost time and merciless awakenings ran together. He had to know how soon Karin might walk in, innocent, trusting, and full of romantic notions he had put into her head.

  They were cursing and striking him again. He hardly felt or heard any of it. His natural love of water and his lifelong testing of his ability to hold his breath made the dunking experience almost pleasant. Only the passage of time was important. The secret weakness they had no reason to suspect seemed to finally be chipping away at his resistance to slipping into a state they wouldn’t be able to beat him awake from.

  He had no fear of divulging the information they sought to save himself more torture. Soon enough he shouldn’t be able to tell them anything coherent. But he knew very well that there was no torture like seeing someone you loved tortured.

  He prayed, as much as he could between the battering and fading awareness, that he would not be faced with that ordeal. Would he betray his oath and his training to spare this woman he had never even have a chance to meet? Not that it would spare her anything – but the psychological pressure would be enormous. Could he somehow hasten the moment when he would be beyond telling them anything? If that happened, would they leave and let her walk away?

  Karin, of course, had no information to give them. Nothing in the research she had done could be pieced together into useful knowledge of what his operation had uncovered using her work as a basis. He had never dismissed her as naive or ignorant. He knew she was brilliant. That was why the Laptop Project needed her so badly.

  But the idea of using a highly-gifted civilian researcher had been Murali’s pet project. He had taught the others how to compartmentalize the different aspects of the operations to make them seem unrelated. Karin had more than once accused him of being so eclectic in his search for knowledge as to be positively eccentric. He had happily pled guilty, knowing that meant she had no idea what the agents posing as students had really been looking for.

  It meant she should be kept safe from those who might think she could betray the agency’s secrets. Five minutes of questioning would convince anyone but a sadist that interrogating her was a waste of time. He had no way of protecting Karin from the sort of person who just wanted to hurt others, except by praying daily for her. That, he done for a long time.

  Never in his wildest dreams had he thought he would fall in love with that civilian researcher sight unseen. Nor had he imagined someone would out him as a spy and, worse still, follow him to this place on this night, of all nights, to torture him for that last bit of intel. He was past cursing his pride and blindness, too.

  Only one hope remained. If he was past talking– past awakening – before Karin arrived, they might leave and never touch her. She could not be used as leverage to get him to talk if he was no longer able to speak. It was only a matter of time before his lifelong curse became the blessing that saved his secrets and the woman he was absolutely certain he loved.

  "We’re getting nowhere," a voice that echoed and sounded too high-pitched and far away said. "I’ll have to ease up on him. I didn’t think he was such a weakling."

  "We’re running out of time," another distorted voice replied. "The information might be worthless if we don’t get it to the buyers by the deadline."

  "Just wait for the pretty little reference librarian to show up. He’ll talk when we start to have some fun with her."

  Murali hung over the metal tub, trying to get colder, weaker – to let his consciousness steal away faster. He had put off eating lunch because he was running late. At the time it had only seemed a little risky. Now it seemed like a godsend, if a ironic one. Surely enough time had passed by now. Surely his cramping stomach, clamoring its emptiness over the din of his chattering teeth and palsied shaking, promised this would soon be over.

  Every sound became a clanging gong inside his head. Every movement was just a helpless spasm. He held his breath as he had while under the water, trying to rob his body of its last scrap of energy. A blow between his shoulderblades forced his lungs to empty and a burst of pain shot through him that made him suck in one more gasp of air.

  "Why do you keep doing that?" A man’s voice spewed curses. "Trying to make yourself pass out? We’ll just keep waking you up. It’s not as if you can suffocate yourself. At some point you are going to tell us what we want to know."

  "Don’t think we won’t hurt your sweetheart," the other man’s voice said. "We know you’re hoping we go too far and kill you before she gets here. Not a chance. You’ll talk to save her, if not to save yourself."

  God protect Karin. Please put me past telling them anything. Please help her. Please. The echo and clanging in his head got too loud. He couldn’t hear his own prayer anymore. The noise changed to something that sounded impossibly like a gunshot. Two of them, in fact. After that, all he heard was silence.

  ***

  Murali woke up very slowly and took a long time to climb out of a white haze so thick it took all his strength to push through it. When he thought he must finally have pried his eyes open he still saw nothing but white.

  "Merry Christmas," said a voice. It was unfamiliar, but it was very feminine and sweet.

  He realized he was staring at a white tile ceiling when the blurred edges finally formed up and the little acoustical pockmarks swam into view. Murali turned his head toward the sound. A blonde in a stained and rumpled peacock blue dinner dress sat holding his hand. Her mascara had smeared pretty badly behind her glasses. Her French roll hung lopsided alongside her neck. One silver snowflake dangled from an ear. The other one had only a tiny broken chain. How beautiful she looked.

  "Karin," he rasped.

  "Murali," she replied. She even pronounced it correctly. "It’s a good thing I knew what to tell the paramedics. They wouldn’t have known the right treatment. In the future that’s one secret you are not going to keep. Medical alert bracelet for you."

  "How did you –?" Murali smiled. "My screen name. You looked it up."

  "That’s what I do," Karin replied. "I knew it was Hindi. Of course I was curious to find out what it meant. Madhumeha. Roughly equivalent to the Greek word Diabetes. You thought you could slip into d
iabetic shock – maybe even a coma, didn’t you? Then you wouldn’t be able to talk. I was so scared. You were so … So close to making that happen, the doctor said."

  "What … did you do?" Talking hurt. A lot. But he had to know why he was alive, and free, and so was Karin.

  "I came to the house and found the front door open and everything dark."

  "Which is when you should have called for help, and driven away," Murali chided.

  "I heard the sounds of – of what they were doing to you. I didn’t think you – I was afraid you wouldn’t last until – Anyway, I had locked my keys and my phone in my car. Do you have any idea how much a locksmith costs?"

  He tried to laugh. That hurt worse.

  "God seemed to want me to save you, so I went in. Apparently they suffered from lack of thugs. The two of them were busy with you. No one was on guard. I followed the sounds to the bathroom. Right outside the door I found a very large rifle. I picked it up, shoved open the door, and yelled, "Get away from him if you want to live!"

  "You knew how to use an automatic rifle?"

  "Don’t pretend you haven’t got a whole dossier on me, Mr. Spy. You know very well my father taught me how to shoot and took me hunting for years. It was just a different kind of gun. I figured it out in time to shoot the first one before he could grab me. Once he went down, the other man was pretty easy to convince. I called 911 on the phone he let me use after I wounded him."

  Murali had to admit that the way she chewed the inside of her cheek was thoroughly charming. She had been telling her story with a good deal of gusto, but the air went out of her sails very suddenly.

  "You were willing to die to protect your information, weren’t you?" she asked with a quiver in her voice.

  "I hoped it would protect you," he replied, after hesitating over whether to tell her. "If I was unable to talk, they’d have no reason to use you as leverage."

  "Oh," she whispered. "I wouldn’t have thought of that. You were so brave."

  Murali swallowed. Time to change the subject from his career as a spy. What a time for her to find him out, when he had hoped it was over.

  "How do you do?" he said, with the best grace he could muster lying in a hospital bed recovering from diabetic shock. "My name is Murali Nanda. I have looked forward to meeting you for a long time. And Merry Christmas."

  Karin smiled. "I’m very pleased to meet you. I’m Karin Arthur, and I hope our next Christmas together will be very dull and boring."

  "I like the sound of that," Murali said, "the part about us having a next Christmas together. You must be pretty brave, too, if everything that’s happened hasn’t scared you off yet." His eyes dropped to her hand, still holding his. Glancing back up, her saw her blush spreading. She didn’t let go, however.

  "I have to at least tell you I’m sorry," Karin said, "whatever else happens."

  "For what?"

  "It’s my fault they found out where you were staying. I should have been more careful with your address. Memorized and eaten it, or something."

  "I don’t understand."

  "While I’ve been sitting here waiting for you to wake up, I thought about how they could know where to find you. The only other person who could have seen your address was Gail, the head librarian. I realized Gail skyped me to try to get me to let something slip that would tell them where you were. She had to have seen your address on my notepad while we were talking. I’m so sorry."

  "Ah. Well, you weren’t supposed to know I was a spy whose cover needed protecting. In fact, I’ve been trying to retire so I wouldn’t be a spy by the time we met. So it wasn’t your fault."

  "But they could have killed you. Next time I will not even write it down. I promise."

  "There isn’t going to be a next time," Murali said. "At least, with your permission. From now on, you’ll always know where I am, because I’ll always be with you."

  "Oh …" Karin’s voice dropped to a whisper. "Isn’t that sudden? Shouldn’t we have some sort of courtship?"

  "I’ve already spent years courting you," Murali said. "Do not seriously tell me all my pretty speeches fell on deaf ears."

  Karin blushed and smiled wider. "They were so subtle, I wasn’t sure. I knew – I mean – I thought I knew – I wanted to think –"

  Murali turned his hand over and closed his fingers around hers. It was all he could manage. "I’m tired of being subtle," he said. "On the other hand, right now, I’m just … tired."

  "I should let you rest. But Gerald – I mean, Mr. Owens – he did want to speak to you."

  "Gerald?" Murali repeated. "You two are on a first-name basis now?’

  "Oh – no – I just – he arrived right after I shot those two. He helped so much – I don’t know what would have happened if he hadn’t been there. Let me go tell him you’re awake."

  "Don’t go," Murali said, trying to tighten his grip so she wouldn’t escape. "Please. I’ll use the call button."

  A nurse answered the call and Murali asked her to send Gerald in. He arrived a split second later.

  "Merry Christmas, Gerald," Muralis said.

  "Bah humbug," he replied.

  Karin covered her mouth but a splutter escaped. Gerald shot her a severe look.

  Murali flicked his eyes between the two of them. "Thank you for deciding to chaperone, Gerald."

  "I knew the lady was conflicted," he responded with a straight face. "I thought maybe Bruno could vouch for you and that would put her at ease."

  "Bruno!" Karin exclaimed. "Oh, when I saw him come in, I didn’t know what to think!"

  "Bruno just got a bit nervous when he realized there’d been trouble," Gerald replied. "It’s part of his training to jump in and try to help. He sort of got ahead from me."

  "Yes, people do have mixed reactions to Bruno," Murali agreed. "I think it has something to do with his size. He’s very gentle with the good guys, though."

  "He is … big," Karin said cautiously.

  "He took to you right away, though, I bet," Murali said to Karin.

  "There wasn’t a lot of time to get acquainted," Karin admitted. "I was … preoccupied."

  "Not quite the way you imagined your first kiss?" Gerald deadpanned.

  Murali’s sagging eyelids snapped up and he stared at Karin.

  "You … you stopped breathing," she offered. "I gave you mouth-to-mouth."

  "Ah," Murali said. "I had hoped to be able to take your breath away. Not quite the way I imagined that, either."

  "I need to debrief you," Gerald said, in the mildest possible tone of voice. "It’s already been three hours. The clock is ticking on finding out who sent those guys and who they hoped to sell the intel to."

  "How did you know they wanted to sell the intel to someone?" Murali asked.

  "I bugged your house, of course," Gerald replied. "Ms. Arthur, I know it’s a great imposition, but Bruno is in my car. If you wouldn’t mind taking him for a walk while Mr. Nanda and I chat?"

  "Who’s the boss and who’s the employee here?" Karin joked as she rose and took the keys Gerald held out.

  "We’re both employees," Murali replied. "Not even sure who the boss is. It’s above both our pay grades."

  "Thank you, Ms. Arthur. Bruno will be happy to see you." Karin left the room and Gerald sat down beside Murali’s bed.

  "I thought you would look better by now. What’s the prognosis?"

  "I have no idea. You and Karin are the only ones I’ve seen."

  "All right. I’ll get a briefing on that as soon as we get through this. Tell me exactly what happened. Start from the time you rented the house. Anyone you contacted. Anything you did, strange or not strange. You know the drill."

  Murali told him everything he could think of. He wanted to present a tidy, lucid report, but his brain didn’t feel at all orderly at the moment. He wanted to sleep, but he wanted Karin to come back more. Somehow he ran out of information to give. "Did Karin tell you about the Skype with that head librarian?" he asked finally.

&nbs
p; "I know it happened. Why should she tell me about it?"

  "Karin concluded that Gail saw the house address at that time and reported it to the men who attacked me."

  "She did?" Gerald stood up very suddenly. "I need to see if I can lay hands on the head librarian."

  "I’m surprised you didn’t bug Karin’s apartment," Murali quipped.

  "I had no authorization to do that," Gerald replied.

  "Who authorized you to bug my house?" Murali’s eyes narrowed.

  "You did. You told me years ago that I could do whatever was necessary to help you. I guess you should have authorized me to do the same for Ms. Arthur."

  "I’m authorizing it now," Murali said. "This isn’t over."

  "I agree." Gerald left.

  ***

  A doctor arrived a few moments later and examined him. "How do you do, Mr. Nanda? What a way to spend Christmas, eh? I certainly haven’t seen too many people so banged up from a fall in the tub. The diabetic shock was quite severe, too. You won’t be alone if you go home, will you?"

  "I have a couple of friends who will be looking in on me," Murali promised.

  "Very good. You should recover without complications if you take it easy and rest. I wanted to keep you for observation but Christmas Eve is overflow time in the hospital ERs. You seem to be improving and generally in great physical shape. I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and let you leave as soon as your IV is empty and we get the paperwork processed. Please watch your blood sugar more carefully and keep those friends close."

  Karin slipped in the half-opened door.

  "I certainly intend to try," Murali said with a smile.

  Six

  Karin smiled at the doctor as he turned to go.

  "Gerald says you should be discharged in about an hour," she said. "Not sure how he knows that, but ..."

  "Gerald is a savant about scheduling," Murali replied. He glanced up at his IV bag. "The doctor says paperwork and empty the bag, so I'd say Gerald's surmise is correct."

  "You look much better," Karin said.