When Heaven Weeps (48 page)

“
She
is causing my death. Helen is forcing me to die,” Jan said.

“No more than you have caused the death of Christ. Yet he loved you no less.” A wide smile spread across the stranger's face and the moonlight glinted off his eyes. “But the fruits of love are worth death, my friend. A thousand deaths.”

“The fruits?”

“Joy. But for the joy set before him, Christ endured the Cross. Unspeakable joy. A million angels kissing one's feet could not compare to the rapture found in the tender words of one human.”

Jan swallowed. This stranger would know, he thought, although he wasn't sure why. He stood and paced the floor of the gazebo, thinking of these words. He turned his back to the man and stared out at the round white moon. The man was no ordinary friend of Ivena, surely. Not with this insight.

The edge is gone from my pain already
, he thought.
I have spoken to this man for no more than a few minutes and my heart is feeling hope again
.

“And what of Helen?” Jan asked without looking back. “How will she learn to love? She must
die?”

It was a backward way of looking at the universe, he thought. He'd always understood the place of death, as it related to life. A seed must fall to the ground and die before giving life to the tree. But he'd never associated death with
love
. Yet it was in love—in the death of self required by love—that it made the clearest sense. The man hadn't answered his question.

“You're saying that she too”—he turned to the man—“must find—”

He caught himself mid-sentence. The man was gone. Jan spun around, found no one and stepped from the gazebo. The stranger was not in sight! He had said his piece and then left.

Jan called into the night, “Hello. Is anybody there? Hello.” But the garden remained still except for his own voice.

The stranger's words echoed through his mind.
She is desperate for your love
.

What was he doing? His whole life—all of eternity—seemed to be in the balance for this one woman. For Helen. And he had all but cursed her.
Oh, dear Helen. Forgive me!

Jan tore for the path and angled for the east wall that hid Joey's cottage. A panic fluttered through his stomach.

Oh, Father, forgive me!

THE PINTO was still missing when Jan burst through the hedge. He slid to a stop on the gravel, his heart thumping in his chest. She had come back and left already, perhaps.

He bounded up the cottage steps and flung the door open. A dim lamp glowed by the single rattan chair, casting light over Ivena's face.

“She hasn't come yet, Janjic.” She'd been crying, he could hear it in her voice. Ivena walked toward him without waiting for him to close the door. She placed her arms around him and laid her head against his chest. “I am sorry, dear. I am very sorry.”

Jan put his hand on her head. “So am I, Ivena. But we aren't finished. There's more to this story. Isn't that what you've been saying?”

“Yes.” Ivena stepped back and sniffed. “I have been praying for your understanding, Janjic.”

He stepped into the cottage and closed the door. “And God has answered your prayer.”

She smiled. “Then I will retire now.”

“And I will wait for her.”

Ivena and Joey each slept in the bedrooms, leaving the living room to Jan, a gracious gesture considering the circumstances. The night rested eerily quiet. Crickets chirped in the forest, but no traffic sounds reached the cottage. Jan suddenly felt a return of the pain that had flooded his bones earlier. He sank to his knees by the amber lamp, feeling destitute.

What if Helen did not return? Silence rang in his ears, high-pitched and piercing. He gripped his hands into fists. How could the stranger in the garden possibly know of this dread that rushed through his veins? It was death. His heart was being torn to shreds by a death no less real than Father Micheal's. At least the priest had gone to the grave with a smile.

He gritted his teeth, biting back a shaft of fury.

No, Janjic. If you die, it will be for love.

I am dying for love and it is killing me.
He should brand that on his forehead. He slumped to his haunches, overcome by grief. The night blurred in his vision.

For a long time Jan knelt like a lump of clay, feeling lifeless. He got up once and poured himself a glass of tea, but he left it full on the counter after a single sip. He walked to the fireplace and slid along the wall to his seat.

The noise came to his ears then. It was a slight grating and it was at the front door. He had not heard a car approach.

He looked up, thinking it was the wind—it would cease any moment. But it didn't. In fact, if he wasn't mistaken, it was the front latch and it was being poked and scratched. Jan came halfway to his feet, his heart pounding.

And then the door swung in, open to the night, and Jan froze. She stood there. Helen stood there, wavering on her feet, taking in the room as if she were trying to understand it.

It occurred to Jan in that moment that he should scream at her. He should slap her and send her packing, because she was standing in the doorway, obviously stoned, slinking back from that beast.

But he could do no such thing. Never.

Helen took two steps forward and stopped again in a wedge of light from the moon, orienting herself in the darkness.

Jan stood up in the darkness and she faced him, perhaps not even knowing precisely who he was. “Helen?”

She looked at him with blank eyes glistening in the dim light.

Jan stepped toward her. “Helen, are you okay?”

She stood still, unresponsive.

“Helen, I'm so sorry!” He reached her and saw that she was trembling. He swept her from her feet, and she felt like a rag doll. A limp doll shaking and now whimpering with tears. “Oh, my dear. I'm so sorry,” he said.

You are sorry for precisely what, Janjic? It is she, not you, who has betrayed.

But it is I who love
, he answered himself.

Jan took her to the couch and laid her down. “Sleep, darling. Sleep.” He pulled an afghan over her body. “It's okay. I'm here now.” He knelt beside her and tucked the blanket around her carefully. Tears were streaming down her face, he saw. And his. His heart was breaking for her. Weeping. Like heaven, his heart was weeping for Helen.

She didn't speak to him for a long time, but he knew from her drooping eyes and sweet mouth, wrinkled with anguish, that she felt so much shame. So much that she could not speak it. It was this as much as any lingering intoxication that immobilized her.

Jan laid his head on her breast and he held her gently. They wept together for long minutes. Then she pushed herself up and buried her wet face in his neck.

“I'm sorry . . . ,” she whispered. A sob choked her off.

“Shhhh.” He pulled her tight.

She groaned. “No. I'm so sorry. Oh, God, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry . . .” Her words were loud enough to wake the house.

But Jan couldn't speak for the fist in his throat. He only wept with her and she kept groaning her remorse. It was a union of their spirits and it was sweet. The fruit of love. The stranger was right; his death in forgiveness was nothing compared to this joy.

Slowly she quieted, and he held her against his chest. Her body eventually stopped its shaking and then her breathing fell into a deep steady rhythm. She was asleep. His wife was asleep.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

HELEN KEPT to herself the following morning, nursing a cup of coffee and looking as if she would have chosen to remain hidden under the covers given a choice. Fortunately the hours leading up to Jan's phone call to the police were too mixed with speculation about their futures to give any space to the previous evening's debacle. Now more than ever, it seemed that a meeting with Detective Charlie Wilks was their only hope to save Jan and keep Ivena safe. One thing they all agreed on: Lutz had to be stopped. Regardless of how they felt about it, he quite literally held their lives in his hands. And now that Roald and the council had refused to help, there was no one but the authorities to whom they could appeal.

Jan put an overdue call in to Bill Waldon, an attorney the ministry had used on occasion, but Bill was no defense counsel. He put Jan in touch with a Mike Nortrop who was. Nortrop heard the short version of the story and then announced that there was nothing he could really do until the police charged Jan with a crime. The minute they did, Nortrop would be at the station. In the meantime,
Yes!
Jan must absolutely turn himself in. Running had been a “cockamamie” idea in the first place, he said. He hung up with the insistence Jan call him the minute they had any word.

Helen still didn't like the idea, but Jan saw no alternatives.

He made the call.

“Detective Wilks, please.”

“One moment.”

Ivena, Helen, and Joey all sat around the table, watching Jan in silence.

“Wilks here.”

Jan took a breath and spoke calmly. “Good morning, Mr. Wilks. This is Jan Jovic.”

“Jan. Well, Jan, it's good that you called. We were getting worried down here. Is everything all right?”

“Everything's fine. You're ready to meet?”

“Yes, of course we are,” Wilks said. “I've been waiting for your phone call. Just tell me where you are.”

Helen suddenly leaned forward and waved her hand frantically, whispering words Jan could not understand.

“Hold the phone a second.” He covered the mouthpiece with his palm. “What?”

“Tell him to meet you alone, first. Not here.”

“I thought our point was to secure protection for Ivena,” he whispered.

“Just ask him. Please, it can't hurt.”

Jan lifted the phone. “Hello?”

“I'm waiting, Jovic.”

“I would like to meet you alone,” he said. “Without Ivena.”

“Alone? That wasn't the deal.”

The detective's voice had tightened, and it triggered an alarm in Jan's spine. Why would the man care? He glanced at Helen. “It's me you want.”

“We had a deal, Mr. Jovic. Now you're backing out of that deal, is that it?”

“Why are you interested in seeing Ivena? She's done nothing.”

“That was
your
deal, mister.”

“Yes, and now I'm changing it. Do you have a problem with that?”

“Yes, I have a problem . . .” He heard the man take a deep breath. Jan knew then that Helen was right. He could not trust the police. Heat washed over his shoulders.

“Look, Mr. Jovic, let's be reasonable—”

“I am trying to be reasonable. But I don't understand
your
reason. What crime has Ivena committed that you need to see her?”

“Please, Jan. Okay to call you Jan?”

“Sure.”

“Okay, Jan. You've broken the law, do you understand that? I can book you on a dozen counts as we speak. Now you don't turn yourself in like we agreed and I swear I'll put you away as a felon, you hear me?”

“Yes, but why
Ivena?”

“Because that was the deal! I need to verify her story,” the detective snapped. “And don't think I can protect you if you don't play ball, buster. Glenn may be the victim on this one, but believe me, he knows how to play both sides.”

“That sounds like a threat.”

“You just tell me where you are.”

“I will call you back, Detective Wilks. Good-bye.”

Jan dropped the phone in its cradle, his head buzzing from the exchange.

“What did he say?” Helen blurted. “He went weird on you, didn't he? I told you he was in Glenn's hands. I knew it!”

Jan shook his head, unbelieving.

“The police are corrupted by Glenn, then?” Ivena asked.

“And I'll tell you something else,” Helen said. “We won't be safe here forever.”

They all turned to her. “Why?” Joey asked.

“They know we're north of town. They followed me that far before I lost them.”

Silence settled around Joey's kitchen table. No one knew quite how to deal with the revelation.

“Which basically means we've got a problem,” Jan said. “A very big problem. We have no one to turn to.”

“Karen?” Ivena asked.

“She has no political clout. She might be help in a courtroom, as a witness, but not with the police now. What does it matter if we're in the right if Glenn kills Ivena? What we need is protection now.” He shook his head. “I can hardly believe it's come to this. It's a free country, for heaven's sake!”

“Can the ministry help?”

“No.”

“What about other friends? Surely you have well-placed friends,” Joey said.

“I've been in the country for five years. Apart from Roald and Karen and their circle I'm only a passing face. And what does it matter? Glenn owns the rights to the movie. He owns me!”

“No one owns you, Janjic. What is this movie? I told you—”

“The movie is the future of the ministry, Ivena. Say what you like, but it's the gateway to a million hearts. And it's a livelihood.”

“Not if Glenn Lutz owns it.”

She was right. She could not be more right.

“Then what?” Joey asked. “I'm not hearing too many options that make sense.”

No one responded.

“It's not safe here. What do we do?” Joey asked quietly, his eyes wide.

Jan knew then what they had to do. He'd known deep inside from the moment Roald walked out of the conference room last night. But it was suddenly very clear. He glanced at Helen and wondered how she would respond.

He snatched up the phone and punched in a number. The others only stared at him. It rang four times before someone picked up.

“Hello?”

“Betty?”

“Jan! Jan what on earth's happening? The police are—”

“Thank God you're there. Listen to me carefully, Betty. I need you to hear me very carefully. Is anyone else in the room?”