Bonnie kept pointing, her arm now shaking. “As if you really cared about them. Can’t you see you’re using them? They’re people! I noticed no one ever mentioning
you
volunteering to get transluminated!”
Ashley walked slowly toward her bed. Her voice stayed calm, sounding almost condescending as she raised her eyebrows and chin. “I have to run the equipment, Bonnie. It would be suicide for a diver if something went wrong and I wasn’t available to fix it.”
Still fuming, Bonnie grabbed Ashley’s arms and turned them over to expose the undersides. “But it’s okay to use other people for pincushions, I see, and keep your own skin from getting gouged over and over again.”
Ashley shook Bonnie’s hands loose and pulled her arms back. “It’s the same deal, Bonnie. If something bad happened to me, who would continue the research? No one else knows how the photoreceptors work.”
Bonnie folded her arms across her chest. “Are you sure they really do work?”
Ashley’s brow furrowed, and her eyes seemed to darken. “Of course I’m sure. My grandfather is living proof.”
Bonnie moved her hands back to her hips, and her wings shuddered like they were trying to throw off a chill. “So you’re willing to take chances with these girls but not with yourself? I guess it’s okay if something happens to them, because they’re not as smart as you are. I guess they’re expendable.”
Ashley folded her arms across her chest. “Well, I wouldn’t put it that way.”
Bonnie drilled her stare into Ashley. “Then how would you put it?”
Ashley stepped toward Bonnie, gazing down at her from her two-inch height advantage. “These girls would either be dead or on their way to prostitution by now if they weren’t here. They have food and clothes, and their sacrifice will benefit the entire world.”
Bonnie held her ground. “Sacrifice?” she repeated, leaning forward and waving her arms. “You call being imprisoned and forced to be a lab rat a sacrifice? The Nazis experimented on the Jews in the name of science. Oh, those wonderful sacrificial Jews! Wasn’t it nice how they gave their lives for the benefit of mankind? And how about aborted babies? Isn’t it sweet of them to lend their bodies to scientists for stem cell research? Some day all of humanity will give thanks for their sacrifice!”
Bonnie scowled and turned her back on Ashley, folding her arms and huffing. “For being so smart, you sure are clueless, Ashley. My father’s got the wool pulled over your eyes big time.”
Ashley’s voice lowered, and she sounded more like a wounded puppy than an intimidating debater. “What do you mean by that?”
Bonnie turned back around. Pain branded Ashley’s expression, and Bonnie’s rapid boil slowed to a simmer. She didn’t want to hurt her new friend; she just wanted to make everything right—to free her mother and the girls. But she wasn’t sure how much she should tell Ashley, at least not yet.
“Ashley, there’s a lot going on here that doesn’t make any sense.” She picked up Ashley’s keys from the bed and jingled them. “Tell me. Why don’t you have a key to the Omega door?”
Ashley blinked at the key ring, as if trying to focus through sleepy eyes. “I haven’t had a need for it. Your father has the only one.”
“But you have keys to everything else, right?”
Ashley squinted and paused for a second. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“Well, what could be in that cave that’s such a secret?”
Ashley let out an impatient sigh. “It’s a passage that used to lead outside, but after we brought all our equipment in here, part of it caved in during a minor earthquake. It’s too dangerous to go through anymore; that’s why we named it ‘Omega,’ the last letter in the Greek alphabet. It’s sort of like saying, ‘If you try to go through there, you’re finished.’ So, to protect the girls, your father has a continuous audio stream running on a laptop computer. It plays random monster noises that he downloaded from the Internet. He just wants to keep the kids from ever trying to go in there.”
Bonnie nodded slowly. “I figured it was something like that, but why doesn’t he want you to go in there? Maybe he’s hiding something else.”
Ashley pushed her hand through her tangled hair. “I can’t imagine what.” She pointed to her keys in Bonnie’s hand. “I guess he doesn’t want any extra keys left around for people to get ahold of.”
“Okay, okay,” Bonnie said, laughing. “I’m busted. At least you’re right about that.” Her tone turned serious again, and she gestured toward the hall. “But what about these girls, and what about Derrick? Do you really think it’s right to use human beings as guinea pigs against their will?”
Ashley shrugged her shoulders. “I guess I saw them as willing participants. They didn’t kick or scream or anything. We give them whatever they want, within reason, of course, and they do what we ask.”
“But that’s just the point. You’re treating them like animals—you feed them, keep them warm, and clean their cages. So now it’s okay to ravage their bodies? Don’t you see that they’re real people, and they’re scared? Just because nobody loves them, you think you can use them?” Bonnie glanced upward and whispered a silent prayer.
God give me the right words to say
. She took a deep breath before continuing. “Well, I know someone who loves them, and He doesn’t look kindly on mistreating orphans.”
Ashley’s brow knitted three rows of angry wrinkles, and her lips tightened into two pale lines. “Is this turning into a ‘God loves everyone’ speech? Because if it is, I don’t want to hear it. Daddy kept trying to tell me that, always singing ‘Amazing Grace,’ but I asked him to quit a long time ago. If God were so amazing or so loving, Daddy wouldn’t have suffered so much, and I wouldn’t be such a Brainiac freak.” She waved her arm toward the hall. “If God loved Pebbles, she wouldn’t have been left to die on the beach, wandering in a dirty diaper and spitting sand from her bloody lips. And if God loved Stacey, she wouldn’t have been accosted by a pervert in a dark alley who would have abused her and left her for the other street predators to finish off. These kids were worthless throwaways. Nobody really loved them, and they wouldn’t have amounted to anything. But at least we’re making them into something useful, something they can be proud of.”
Bonnie put one hand on her friend’s shoulder. Ashley tried to pull away, but Bonnie held firm. “Ashley, love isn’t based on what someone can give or how much they can do. I mean, everyone loves the rich and famous, right? But it’s all fake. People just want to hang around them because they’ve got money. True love is treating bums and outcasts like they have diamonds in their pockets, even when there’s nothing there but moths and holes.”
Bonnie paused and pointed toward Ashley’s painting on the wall. “It sounds to me like your grandfather was pretty worthless not too long ago, at least in other people’s eyes. But your painting proves you had different eyes. You had eyes of love that saw past his decaying body and into his heart. I’ll bet you can do the same for girls like Karen and me.” Bonnie pulled up her sleeve and exposed the soft underside of her arm.
Ashley stared at her smooth skin, and, slowly, with trembling fingers, caressed her white needle scars. Bonnie pressed her own hand down on Ashley’s and met her eyes when she lifted her head. “Don’t you think these girls deserve our love, too, Ashley?”
Ashley’s eyes grew wet, and she lowered her gaze. She sniffed hard and sat on the bed, her head bobbing.
Bonnie sat next to her, putting one arm around her shoulders and leaning her cheek on Ashley’s disheveled hair.
Ashley wept openly, halting and sniffing while she tried to talk. “You’re . . . you’re right. Deep inside I knew it all along. But I kept telling myself that it would . . . that it would all be over soon. We’d finish up and get these girls into good homes somehow.”
Ashley put both arms around Bonnie’s neck, and they held each other for a few quiet minutes, Ashley’s gentle crying the only sound breaking the silence. Bonnie felt Ashley’s tears soaking through her nightgown, and the warm wetness reminded her of a song. She sang the chorus softly.
“I felt every teardrop when in darkness you cried, and I strove to remind you, that for those tears I died.”
Then she whispered, “Love opens our eyes, Ashley. It always leads us to the truth, even if it takes a long time.”
Ashley looked up. Thin red lines bordered her narrowing pupils. “Truth? Are you sure you want the truth? If you ever heard one of Stacey’s stories, you might change your mind.”
Bonnie grabbed the bedspread and pulled it tight across the surface. “Believe me, I understand. I saw my own mother lying in a pool of blood.” She swallowed away the catch in her throat. “Sometimes the truth is ugly; sometimes it hurts, but love helps us overcome evil in all of its deceptions and brutality.”
Ashley blinked at Bonnie, and a new tear trickled down her cheek. “Yeah, I forgot about what happened to your mother. I can’t understand how you’re not boiling with rage at your father after all you’ve been through.”
“Well, I don’t trust him.” Bonnie sniffed and wiped away a new tear of her own. “But I still love him. . . . I mean . . . I chose to love him, even though it wasn’t easy.” She pressed her finger on the bedspread and drew a cross, staring at it a moment before looking at Ashley again. “Don’t you see? Love is a decision we make, even toward people who don’t deserve it. It’s the only way we can hope to win the battle against Devin, Stacey’s nightmares, or your own fears.”
Ashley wiped her sleeve across her cheek and looked toward the hall again, sighing. “Well, speaking of truth and fears, I have to figure out what Doc’s up to, because I’m not sure he’s telling me everything. My grandfather’s getting sicker, and Doc doesn’t want to call a doctor.” She turned back to Bonnie and grasped both of her hands. “But I do know one thing for sure.”
Bonnie felt the warmth in Ashley’s fingers and the strength of her grip. She had good information about what her father was up to, but could she completely trust Ashley and tell her what she knew? “One thing? What’s that?”
“I know you want your mother back. We need to get her out of that candlestone, and I’m not going to let you down.”
Chapter 11
After a few hours of sleep in a Missoula motel, Billy sat bolt upright in bed. He had been dreaming about lightning—scattered, streaking bolts through an ink black sky. It was peaceful at first, like watching a distant storm through a bedroom window while waiting for sleep to carry him away. But as the dream continued, the storm approached, stalking him as he tried to escape through dark, borderless realms. White-hot bolts crashed all around, hemming him in and finally trapping him in a circular cage of fiery, pulsating bars of pure light. One of the bars grew appendages and plunged its supercharged fingers into his chest, numbing his abdomen and thrusting an electric shock through every nerve, from his toes to the top of his head.
Billy let out a slow breath and shook his head. Whew! That was some wake-up call!
He slid out of bed, stretched his arms, and let out a big, blood-pumping yawn. Smacking his dry lips, he glanced at Walter, wrapped in his blanket like a cocooned caterpillar who never heard spring’s reveille. Billy’s mother lay in the other bed, curled to one side and hugging the extra pillow. The professor slept on a rollaway cot next to the door, his pillow on the carpet and one bare foot sticking out from under his covers.
Billy rubbed his eyes and read the digits on the bedside clock.
Six-fifteen.
He stood up and scratched his head.
I hate waking everyone, but we’d better get moving. I guess I’ll use the bathroom first and let them sleep for a few more minutes.
Billy trudged toward the glow of their bathroom “nightlight,” glancing at the professor’s open suitcase on the floor nearby. The light streaming past the slightly ajar door cast its beam on the book that rested on top of his clothes—Merlin’s Diary.
The old book lay open to the first blank page, or at least what had been the first blank page. From his place in the shadows, Billy stared at the bright surface of the yellowed parchment. Something new was there. He leaped toward it and knelt by the suitcase, trying to read the elaborate script. “Mom! Professor! Walter!”
“What? What?” His mother lurched to a sitting position. Walter groaned, but the professor was already walking toward Billy, smoothing out his hair and tucking in his shirt—the same shirt he had worn yesterday. Getting on his knees, he reached around Billy to his suitcase and fished out his spectacles. He slipped them on while Billy’s mother scrambled to their side.
Billy tried to slow his breathing while he read.
No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment; otherwise he will both tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the new wine will burst the skins, and it will be spilled out, and the skins will be ruined. But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. And no one, after drinking old wine wishes for new; for he says, “The old is good enough.”
The professor sighed and stood up, slowly taking off his glasses. “Very interesting.” He stepped over to the bathroom and opened the door wide, allowing the light to pour over them. “It’s from the Bible,” he announced. “A parable of Christ.”
Billy’s mother placed her hand on the page and ran her fingers across the lettering. “What does it mean?”
“I have my opinions. It’s fascinating that the quote is from a modern translation that came about long after Merlin’s day.”
Walter’s sleepy voice chimed in from across the motel room. “Yeah, Prof, but didn’t the book say that we would be able to read it in our own language?”
“Yes, Walter, you are correct. It’s a curious phenomenon, however, that an old prophet would find a way to write new prose in a book, fifteen hundred years after his day, and in a dialect to which he is unaccustomed. I suppose, though, if a floating hand is able to write cryptic warnings on a Babylonian palace wall, then most anything is possible.”
Billy rubbed his sleepy eyes and faced his teacher. “Floating hand, Professor?”
“Yes. That story is also in the Bible.” Professor Hamilton put on his spectacles again and leaned over to reread the script. “It’s a good thing Merlin has become familiar with our tongue. If he had written it in Latin, I would have to dust off an old textbook or two to translate it.”
Billy’s mother pulled her hand away from the page and stood up. “So, what does it mean?”
“I am familiar with the traditional interpretations of the Scriptural passage, but I’m not sure how the text applies to our situation. Considering our hurry, I should like to ponder it while I prepare for our departure. I will share my thoughts during our drive to the university.”
Billy’s mother and the professor folded up the rollaway while Walter sat on the edge of his bed, stretching and yawning. Billy knew he should get up and get ready, but he couldn’t tear himself away from the book. This was the first time it didn’t communicate in cryptic poetry, yet this entry was every bit as mysterious. But was the page finished? It looked like there was plenty of room for more. Maybe this message continued on the next page.
The mystery of the unknown dragged Billy down, like a hundred-ton weight hanging from his neck. The next page, although never seen and without a voice, beckoned like the beautiful sirens of Homer’s
Odyssey
. Part of Billy’s brain absolutely demanded that he turn the page, while another part whispered, “No, Billy. Danger lies ahead.” He remembered the warnings, penned in Merlin’s own hand, but they were distant, quiet voices, not like the screaming banshees in his head that cried out for the next page. The very warning seemed part of the temptation. What would really happen if he violated its words? If he never tried it, he would never know. No one would. And wouldn’t that be a tragedy, not gaining wisdom that begged to be learned?
Billy’s fingers, stiff, yet trembling, lifted the page, even as the battle in his mind raged on. His hand worked as if separated from his mind’s commands, moving where he begged it not to go.
He turned the page. He let out a long breath as though he had just fought a great battle, but when he read the newly revealed words, he knew he had lost.
“William!” Billy heard the professor’s heavy footsteps. “William! The page wasn’t full!”
Billy couldn’t answer. He could barely breathe. It seemed that a clamp squeezed his throat shut, tightening and cutting off his air supply until his lungs burned, begging for relief. He finally gasped and drank in precious air, puffing until his head swirled in dizziness. But he couldn’t take his eyes off the book. Every word he read pounded in his brain like a judge’s gavel after a death sentence.
The professor’s warm breath glanced off the back of Billy’s neck. “William, I fear that this is very bad news. What you have revealed is a dire prophecy, indeed.”
“Yeah,” Billy replied, his voice low and weak. “I kind of guessed that.”
Billy’s mother and Walter drew nearer as the professor read aloud.
Of covenants broken, covenants lost
A promise made yet torn in two
Thou never learned salvation’s cost
And now bring forth thy vengeance due
Cruel yokes and whips designed for slaves
No, not for heirs nor sons by birth
They tear the backs of stiff-necked knaves
Who think their power comes from earth
Yet hope remains, dispelling fears
A faithful heart, entrapped, alone
Who prays for thee unceasing tears
And casts appeals before his throne
The soul set free must face the beast
And break his chains to fears of earth
To free the faithful heart of love
And prove the seeds of royal birth
The professor picked up the diary, slapped the covers together, and with a quick thrust, tucked the book tightly under his arm. His face reddened, and his eyes narrowed. “I believe that I shall keep it by my side from now on.” He closed his suitcase and carried it into the bathroom. “If you don’t mind, I would like to go first. I am fast and tidy, and I would like to hasten outside to consider this matter alone.” He shut the door, leaving the rest of them in darkness.
Walter bounded over his bed and flipped on the lights. Billy’s mother reached for her son with both hands and pulled him to his feet, wrapping an arm around his shoulder as he straightened. He knew she was trying to give comfort, but it didn’t help. Once again he had lost a battle, this time with his own mind. He pummeled himself inside, using insults he wouldn’t throw at a dog. He felt weak, helpless, and trapped, like a beast in a cage, proud and deplorable at the same time, and most of all, selfish beyond belief.
When the professor came out, he gave Billy a sad smile and a pat on the back. He said nothing, yet Billy felt like his teacher had poured healing salve on a deep wound. The sting was diminishing, but a heavy, ponderous weight remained. After the professor bundled up and went outside, the other three hurried through quick showers and revolving door bathroom sharing before joining him.
Billy stepped into the cold, dark Montana morning, two suitcases in his gloved hands. With Walter following a few paces behind, he jogged across the parking lot, his teeth already chattering when he caught up with the professor. “Brrrr! It’s gotta be about two degrees out here.”
The professor opened the rear door of their rented Jeep and took a suitcase from Billy. “It’s four degrees, William, on the Fahrenheit scale, of course.”
Billy threw his suitcase into the back. “Four degrees? Professor, is there anything you don’t know?”
The professor pointed toward a bank sign across the street. “I was merely taking note of the local media report. It has been dropping ever since I came out.”
Billy watched the bank sign announce the temperature in shivering single digits. The numeral four flashed once, then changed to a three. “How about that! My guess was pretty close.”
“We’re not here to audition for the Weather Channel,” Walter said. “Let’s just get our freezing fannies moving and get something hot to eat.”
Billy jogged back to the motel and carried Excalibur out in a long florist box they had found next to a dumpster at the rental car depot. His mother followed, hustling through the crackling cold air.
“Walter’s hungry, Mom.” Billy poked Walter’s lean stomach. “As usual.”
She pointed down the street at a set of bright neon lights. “We can grab something at that burger place.”
The professor clasped his arms and bounced on his toes. “Just some hot tea for me, and I’ll be fine.”
After a quick and quiet breakfast of meat-filled biscuits and orange juice, they headed for the university. Billy’s mom followed the signs pointing to the campus while the professor sat stoically in the passenger seat. Billy sat with Walter in the back and kept his eye on his teacher. The old professor’s gaze was locked straight ahead, his left arm stiff against his side, binding Merlin’s Diary in place.
Billy wanted to get a conversation going, but he felt timid, low, and unworthy. He nudged Walter and whispered. “Ask the professor about what we read in the book this morning.”
Walter nodded and leaned forward. “Hey, Prof! So what’s with all that stuff about old garments and new wineskins?”
The professor angled his head toward the boys, his eyebrows turned downward. “I’m afraid I cannot tell you Walter, nor anyone, for that matter, at least for now.”
Billy had hoped for news that would lift his spirits, make him feel clean again, but the professor’s guarded words hit him like a truckload of sweaty gym socks. The diary held a secret, an old secret, the key to his longings. So far, he had lost every important battle he had fought, only to be rescued by someone with more wisdom or courage. He lacked something—something important he couldn’t name but that he saw in Bonnie and the professor. This book, filled with ancient wisdom, had whispered cryptic messages into his soul, messages that would surely lead him to what he desired with all his heart, and the only man who seemed able to interpret it had decided to clam up.
Billy’s mom stopped at a traffic light and sighed. “If it’s just a Bible verse, Professor, why can’t you tell us what you think?”
The professor laid the book on his lap and placed his palm on the cover. “While I was in the shower, it occurred to me that William’s temptation was understandable. I had projected my own strength upon him, assuming he could exercise self-control according to my own inner constitution. Such an assumption, of course, is nonsense. William has much to learn, and I fear that most of it will come through trials and suffering, as it did for me in my younger years.
“In any case, when I was preparing to leave the water closet, I desired to read the new poem again, but I first turned to the Scripture on the page before, and the rest of that page had appeared.”
He tucked the book under his arm again. “But I’m afraid that I am unable to tell you what it said. The text itself forbade me from even explaining it. It only gave me leave to inform you of my warning, my gag order, if you will. I’m afraid that I am now the only one who may read the book, at least until it gives me leave to share it with others.”
Billy’s shoulders drooped and his throat tightened again, but he managed to keep breathing. Would the feelings of guilt never go away?
Walter moaned. “But Prof, we need that book. It helped us get Excalibur. Who knows what else it could tell us?”
“You are correct, Walter, but I did not say that no one could read it. I shall continue to observe any new text and act according to wisdom’s counsel.”
When they arrived on campus, Billy’s mom parked near the Skaggs Building, and they hurried toward the door, dodging plowed snow mounds and keeping their arms tucked close to their bodies while jogging headlong into a whipping wind. After they hustled through the entryway and crossed the mop-streaked terrazzo floor, they chose to tiptoe up the stairs to the third floor rather than take the elevator.
At the top of the stairs they stepped into a deserted hall, the unblemished vacuum cleaner imprints on the carpet proving that a janitor had recently prepared for the morning’s new stampede. Billy prowled down the corridor, his eyes scanning the number plates on each door. The longer they kept their approach secret, the better, since they had no way of knowing who or what awaited them. He stopped and pointed, keeping his voice low. “Here it is. Right here. Room 340.”