Satan stood stony-faced as the last of the scouts came in from the most distant reaches of heaven. The place was long empty, abandoned ages ago.
He felt the eyes of his lieutenants on him, seeking an explanation. How could they not see what was so obvious? They had been completely and finally defeated.
They waited expectantly, suppressing smirks—victory without a stroke.
He raised his eyes and looked out over the galaxies. He could wander forever in those great wastes, searching for God, who could forever elude him. This was his final punishment.
The Lord had taken Eve and all the angelic host and gone away beyond his reach forever. And Satan was left abandoned, revenge forever denied him, Eve forever withheld from him. He was unable to die, unable to stop suffering, punished for eternity, a living death of no hope.
In his breast unrequited love struggled with unappeasable hatred. Satan in love; love in Satan. Oh, terrible irony. Instead of finding Eve, he had found despair.
“No!” Satan cried. He shook a fist at the indifferent stars. “No! No! No!”
Epilogue
It was spring. The sky was filled once again with migrating birds, moving north, following ancient instincts, eager to reach their destinations to mate, breed, rear young.
Nations of snow geese, continents of Canada geese, multitudes of warblers in their countless hues, varieties, breeds, and configurations, clouds of robins, marauding bands of jays, great flapping tribes of crows, starlings, grackles, small bands of rufous towhees, tight flights of purple finches sailing like buckshot, and predators—the falcons, the hawks, the eagles, the buteos—all raced northward.
And the great black hawk saw them all. She flew higher, she flew faster, she gloried in her undiminished strength and dared the sun. She soared, she wheeled and somersalted.
At mid-morning she felt hunger and from a towering height dived on a flock of mourning doves and took one in a single pass, exultant in her prowess.
On the white branch of a dead sycamore at the end of a lake near the Delaware Water Gap, she tore open her kill and scooped out the red meat inside. When she was finished she preened her feathers and groomed her breast and flew aimlessly away, her life, now and forever, without hope or purpose.
About the Author
William H. Hallahan (1925–2018) was an American novelist of popular literature. He worked as a journalist before embarking on writing in 1970, covering a variety of popular genres: detective fiction, fantasy, thrillers, and spy novels. His 1977 spy novel, Catch Me: Kill Me, won the Edgar Award. Hallahan also published essays on the US military and history.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1983 by the Estate of William H. Hallahan
Cover design by Ian Koviak
ISBN: 978-1-5040-5904-6
This edition published in 2019 by MysteriousPress.com/Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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WILLIAM H. HALLAHAN
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