MIdnight Diner 1: Jesus vs. Cthulhu

by Chris Mikesell

  “To Berlin,” he said with a shake of his head.

  My worst fear about her had to be true. Why else would she go to Berlin now, when Hitler was so close to starting a war? I picked up my pace and rushed in front of her, almost knocking her over. Startled, she backed away frowning.

  Then she recognized me. “Michael! What are you doing here? Don’t tell me you’re going to Berlin?”

  I shook my head. “Level with me right now, lady.” “I beg your pardon?” Her eyes widened.

  “I mean it. Come clean. You stood me up today. You disappeared. You’re taking the train to Berlin tonight? Either you’re completely insane, or you’re working for the Nazis.”

  Her train slowly screeched into the station. She paused until the noise abated. Her eyes were mournful and her shoulders sagged. I heard muffled announcements in the background and inhaled her delicate perfume. I desperately wanted the truth. Yet I didn’t want to know.

  She pursed her lips. “Oh, Michael. You think I work for the Nazis?”

  “What else could I think?” I put my hand on her arm. I was through with her games. I needed truth as badly as I needed a shot of good Irish whiskey.

  “I suppose I could trust you. I’m half mad about you, after all.”

  The sparkle had returned to her eyes, but I wasn’t buying. I dropped my hand to my side.

  She reached up and put both hands on my shoulders. “It’s like this, you beautiful Irishman. I have an older brother. His name is Andrew, my only family now.” She let go, reached into her purse and pulled out a tattered newspaper clipping. “It’s from a paper in Edinburgh, our hometown.”

  I glanced down at it. The headline read, Andrew Duncan, Missing. It went on about how Mr. Duncan, professor of English literature at the University of Hamburg, had disappeared. His sister Claire, who lived in London, hadn’t heard from him in months. There was a small photograph. Andrew resembled Claire.

  It seemed legit, but then why didn’t the SIS office know about this?

  “Andrew was vocal in his disapproval of the Nazis. He disappeared about eight months ago. I’ve been trying to find him.” She stopped and searched my face. If she was telling the truth, she had to tell me more.

  She caught on and continued. “I’ve some friends here and there who have been helping me gather information. I received word early this morning that the Gestapo is holding Andrew in Berlin. I was relieved he hadn’t yet been sent to a camp. I was hoping to go to Berlin and buy his freedom or, or . . . even pay someone to help me get him out.” She finished and took a deep breath, as if she’d been holding her secret forever.

  She wasn’t a bloody Nazi, but merely searching for her brother. Or perhaps a wonderful liar?

  Dare I believe her? But why didn’t London know about this? Maybe they did, and they were suspicious of both Claire and her brother? Did they send me to protect her? I’d have to contact Uncle Harry and ask some hard questions. But first, Claire had more explaining to do.

  “Who were those Germans you met at the student café? The woman embraced you like an old friend.”

  She frowned. “The café? You followed me? Why?” “I’ll explain later,” I said.

  “Marta and the others are Andrew’s former students.”

  “What about Peter Berger? He’s a propaganda writer.”

  “Things are not always what they seem, Michael. You should know that.” “What are you saying? He’s working for the German resistance?”

  She hesitated. “You’re a smart man. Go back and read some of his earlier writings, but this time read between the lines.”

  The conductor called, “All aboard!”

  I stood there wondering how my life had gotten so damned complicated in two days.

  “Everything I told you is easily checked out, especially by a journalist. As I said last night, I like you, Michael Garrett. Very much. I’m truly sorry about lunch. How about a rain check when this is all over?”

  I wanted to remain submerged in her eyes, but I remembered where we were, and came up for air. “You can’t go to Berlin. Hitler is about to invade

  Poland. How will you get out if they close the border?”

  She fixed her gaze on me. There was a stubborn fierceness there, and something else.

  Something like love.

  “I must find my brother. After that, I don’t know. God will be with me.” She gave me a long look and picked up her valise. I took it from her and

  tossed it onto the train. Claire stepped aboard, then leaned down and grasped my hand.

  “Goodbye, Michael Garrett. Take care of yourself. I’ll pray that we’ll meet again someday,” she said with a sad and lovely smile.

  Did I completely trust her? No, that would take a little more time, though her odds had greatly improved. I blew out a breath and leaped aboard the train as it snaked out of the station. I grabbed the woman who’d captured my heart. I held on tight.

  “What are you doing? You have no luggage! What about your passport?” “Ah, you’re a lass who’s practical as well as lovely.” I reached into my

  pocket and produced my ever-present passport and press card. “I know an

  American journalist in Berlin. I’m sure he can lend me a toothbrush.”

  “I’ll have to warn you. I’m half-Irish and strong-headed,” she said, crying and laughing at the same time. People pushed past us. I heard the train chug out of the station. Toward Germany.

  “I think I can handle you.” I planted one fair and square on her lips. She sighed. “Darling, we are completely mad.”

  I kissed her again.

  Then I thought of how Uncle Harry would take the news. I’d find a thousand stories in Berlin. For London’s sake, I’d surely find some worthy information, hopefully before I was sent to a camp or worse. If Claire checked out, together we’d find Andrew and make our way back to Paris. If she didn’t check out, I’d deal with that when the time came. My gut said she was all right. My head and my heart matched, for once.

  “Today is my birthday,” I said.

  She buried her head in my shoulder and whispered a muffled, “Happy

  Birthday, love.”

  I closed my eyes and wondered what the next few days would bring. I had Claire and a doozie of an assignment, probably the most dangerous of my life thus far. God had always protected me. I trusted Him. That was all I needed.

  “Have your tickets ready,” I heard the conductor call. “This is the night train to Berlin.”

  WORK AND WORSHIP

  NEIL RIEBE

  Paul was the first generation of the Carter family to know only city life. He just wasn’t cut out to work as hard and effectively as the other twelve-year-old boys of the wagon train. They were bigger—young farmers growing up in their fathers’ footsteps.

  “Come on,” his father said, his shirt sweat-stained. “Wood is what warms you twice. Once when you cut it, another when you burn it.”

  “It’s hot now,” Paul said. It was the middle of May.

  “I didn’t ask for sass, son. There’s satisfaction in work if you look for it.” His father’s breathing became labored, but it didn’t stop him from lecturing. “Things are changing from here on out. No more schoolin’ ‘n’ playin’. It’s all going to be work. Good wholesome work. Now make another swing with that axe. Build your strength.”

  Paul felt his balance totter as he poised to chop. Mustering his strength, he slammed the axe down on the branch his father had instructed him to cut. It rebounded, jolting his arm with a stinging vibration. Angry, he attacked the branch, making nick after nick, all side by side. None added to the other to make a clean break all the way through.

  “That’s enough,” his father stopped him. “You’re going to wreck the axe. Go help your mother.”

  Paul returned to the covered wagon, his self-respect injured.

  Having overheard what happened, his mother rebuked him with silent disapproval. By the time his father returned from the cottonwoods along the river the ot
her families already had their fires lit.

  The Wilkes family obliged the Carters with some of their wood so they could eat together. Both families originated from Massachusetts, and both were feverishly devout. Mr. Wilkes suggested they conserve their food since the most difficult trek through the Rockies was ahead of them. Paul’s mother argued that would be an affront to God. “The Lord will provide,” she said. Mrs. Wilkes concurred. They ate heartily.

  That night Paul lay awake in the tent while his parents dozed beside him. He gazed at the gleaming silver face of the moon through the flaps, wondering what it would be like gazing down at the slumbering camp from up there.

  He missed his books. His parents made him leave them behind for two reasons. The first had to do with storage space in the wagon. The other was that his mother didn’t think the stories he read were healthy. He loved Irving, Marryat, and Poe. Even if a book was not about ghosts and witches, he read it anyway because he loved to read. Reading made grownups believe he was smart because of the things he knew and the wide range of words he could use.

  Daydreaming became his refuge. To make the trip tolerable he pretended to be a sort of Arthur Gordon Pym, being carried off to parts unknown.

  Lately his dreams became more vivid than his daydreaming, as if his soul were going to unseen places while his body slept. He awoke from his dreams remembering clearly the feel of objects that he had touched, the smell and taste of food he ate, the sounds from streets of nameless towns he had traveled through.

  There was a man in particular who appeared time and again. His clothes were simple, colored in unassuming shades of brown or gray, yet were much more finely woven than Paul’s. He understood Paul’s need for adventure, and took him on sword-swinging escapades, rode horses, and scaled mountains to pay reverence at ancient monuments of strange, unpronounceable gods. And during quiet periods, the man taught him many things beside warm fireplaces in a cozy cottage or inn. A cat was always purring on the man’s lap with many more playing about the room.

  Paul integrated this person into his journal as a wandering hero, dubbing him for the lack of a better name as the “Traveler.”

  Careful not to disturb his parents, he took his journal from under his pillow and wriggled out of the tent till he could fetch the pen and inkwell from the wagon. Under the light of the moon he opened the book. At the top of the first page he had scribed, “The Narrative of P. Zebedee Carter.” Flipping to the last entry he began writing. Instead of jotting down the bare facts, he embellished the day’s events to make them memorable.

  “May 15, 1859,” he wrote, “Upon reaching the Platte River, the caravan discovered that the river’s flowing motions were that of a massive serpent, and the scintillating waves were in truth its scales reflecting the noonday sun.

  “The day was hot and the labor tiring as hundreds of wagons loaded with treasure to pay tribute to the King of the West were pushed on along the riverbank. None of the weary servants of the King could figure how they were going to cross over that behemoth of a serpent to reach Ash Hollow. How they prayed for the Traveler to cross their path again and grant them another portion of his wisdom.”

  AT DAWN THE MEN ON WATCH aimed their sights into the air and jolted the wagon train camp awake with a couple of gun blasts. The women set the fires crackling under their Dutch ovens and spider skillets. The men took down the tents and got the wagons packed. The animals shuffled about in tune with the bustle, whinnying, mooing. Appetites became antsy as the air turned savory from the smells of frying bacon fat and hot coffee.

  The Wilkes joined the Carters for breakfast. Paul felt outnumbered at the campfire. Mr. and Mrs. Wilkes had four children, three boys and one girl. Plutarch was the eldest son at seventeen; Joel, the middle boy, was fifteen; and the youngest, Frances, was age nine. Amelia, the daughter, was eleven.

  Paul found the Wilkes’s boys to be as bland as their blacksmith father. If it didn’t involve horseplay they didn’t know how to interact.

  Amelia engaged in animated conversation with the mothers. To squeeze out compliments at what a perfect little lady she was, she imitated the way they sat and spoke, acting as though she was as mature as they were. Paul raised an eyebrow at her self-satisfied smiles.

  After breakfast Paul gathered the horses from their grazing and brought them alongside the four oxen yoked to the wagon. Turning around, he was surprised to see his mother emerging from the back of the wagon in her Sunday best with her Bible tucked under her arm. His father helped her down and told him to get up in the wagon and change.

  “We’re holding church,” he added.

  “Church!” Paul groaned. “Out here? Why? We haven’t before.”

  “Now that we have settled into a routine,” his mother said, “it’s high time we go back to honoring the Sabbath.”

  He and his father changed into their Sunday best. The Wilkes joined them, dressed in their best clothes.

  A teamster driving the cattle stopped.

  “What are you doin’?” he asked. “Pack your stuff!”

  “Today’s the Lord’s day,” Paul’s mother confronted the man. “If you had any sense, you’d be taking time out for worship yourself.”

  “Sense?” The grubby man’s face twisted. “We’re trying to beat the snow. You wanna git stuck in the mountains when winta sets in?” He shook the rod of his bullwhip like a schoolteacher waving a pointer, gesturing toward the northwest where the Oregon Trail proceeded. “Now put your belongings in order and git your wagons in line to go.”

  “So long as the Lord comes first in this household there will be no fear of inclement weather,” Mrs. Carter rebutted.

  “Crimeny! Mister,” the teamster pleaded with Paul’s father. “Make your woman see reason. Or are you just as much a fool as she is?”

  “I’d appreciate it if you did not call my wife a fool,” Mr. Carter spoke evenly.

  The teamster shook his head and faced the Wilkes. “What about you? You got four youngsters. You gonna risk them?”

  “We’re staying,” Mr. Wilkes stated firmly.

  The teamster swore and hurried to the front of the column. Shortly he returned with the train captain, Harlan Hewitt. Hewitt was a wind-worn mountain man in his forties. He rode over on his horse with his .54 caliber Hawken long arm across his lap.

  “Jake here says you good folks plan on sticking around,” he said, sounding calm, yet admonishing.

  “That’s correct,” Mrs. Carter said.

  “If you plan on stopping every Sunday from here to Willamette Valley, I guarantee you you’ll be wintering in the Rockies in fifteen feet of snow, boiling your ox hides to make glue soup. You should think about what you are risking.”

  Mrs. Carter put her hand on Paul’s shoulder. “We’re obliged by your concern, but we put our trust in the One who can part the Red Sea and make the sun stand still.”

  “Harley,” Jake fumed, “you know I don’t butt my nose where it don’t belong, but this ain’t fair for the kids.”

  “I’m not about to take children from their parents. But I’ll back up the free will of anyone over the age of fourteen who volunteers to accompany the train.”

  “How about it?” Jake urged Plutarch and Joel.

  Looking at the teamster sheepishly, the boys shook their heads. “What about those of us who are twelve,” Paul interjected.

  His mother’s eyes flashed. She pursed her mouth into a tight line and dug her nails into his shoulder. He grimaced and glanced up at her, annoyed.

  “Even if you think you’re old enough to go it alone,” Hewitt said thoughtfully, “do you really want to leave your folks?”

  Paul gazed at his parents, ashamed. His father had a sad expression, and his mother looked betrayed.

  “No. I guess I’m staying.”

  Hewitt nodded. The decision was made. He called Jake back to work, and left the two families to their own devices.

  The Carters and Wilkes got hoots and catcalls from the other emigrants as they passed.r />
  “Remember what our Savior said,” Paul’s mother spoke to fortify their courage. “He who is ashamed of me before man, him will I be ashamed of before my Father in heaven.”

  She got them settled down singing a hymn.

  Once the hymn was complete, Paul’s mother asked her husband to turn to the Word. He opened his Bible and read from the Book of Galatians, Chapter 6, “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.”

  “Very good, Lewis,” Paul’s mother said. “This is an important distinction between us and the others. They fear the snow because they sow after the flesh. So long as we sow after the Spirit we’ll succeed in all our endeavors.”

  THE WAGON-RUTTED TRAIL weaved along the banks of the river. In order to catch up with the train, the parents agreed to go straight at the next bend. In theory the trail should swerve back into their path, thus covering more distance in less time.

  Their first attempt succeeded. On the completion of the second attempt they could swear that they saw trail dust from the other wagons floating on the horizon. The sun was at high noon when they tried their method once more. The shadows were slight and difficult to read for direction. By the time the shadows were long enough there was a growing concern that they had veered off course.

  As the sun reddened they made camp. Buffalo chips had to be used to make a fire. Amelia waved her hand in front of her face.

  “Do we have to burn manure, Ma?”

  “Yes, dear. See, there’s no wood for miles.”

  “Oh, do we have to? Do we have to?” Amelia whined. Mrs. Wilkes did her best to placate her daughter, but it didn’t take long before she sounded as whiny as Amelia.