Dark Rivers of the Heart

“I didn’t enjoy it,” he said.

“I would have.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Immensely.”

“I didn’t hate doing it, either.”

“Why should you? You have to stomp a cockroach when you get a chance.”

“How’s your shoulder?”

“Hurts like hell, but it’s not bleeding all that much.” She flexed her right hand, wincing. “I’ll still be able to work the computer keyboard with both hands. I just hope to God I can work it fast enough.”

The three of them hurried through the depopulated catacombs, toward the blue room, the yellow vestibule, and the strange world above.

* * *

Roy had no pain. In fact, he could feel nothing at all. Which made it easier for him to play dead. He feared that they would finish him off if they realized he was alive. Spencer Grant, aka Michael Ackblom, was indisputably as insane as his father and capable of any atrocity. Therefore, Roy closed his eyes and used his paralysis to his advantage.

After the singular opportunity that he had given the artist, Roy was disappointed in the man. Such blithe treachery.

More to the point, Roy was disappointed in himself. He had badly misjudged Steven Ackblom. The brilliance and sensitivity that he had perceived in the artist had been no illusion; however, he had allowed himself to be deceived into believing that what he saw was the whole story. He had never glimpsed the dark side.

Of course he was always so quick to like people, just as the artist had said. And he was acutely aware of everyone’s suffering, within moments of having met them. That was one of his virtues, and he would not have wanted to be a less tenderhearted person. He had been deeply moved by Ackblom’s plight: such a witty and talented man, locked in a cell for the rest of his life. Compassion had blinded Roy to the full truth.

He still had hope of coming out of this alive and seeing Eve again. He didn’t feel as though he were dying. Of course, he was unable to feel much of anything at all, below the neck.

He took comfort from the knowledge that if he were to die, he would go to the great cosmic party and be welcomed by so many friends whom he’d sent ahead of him with great tenderness. For Eve’s sake, he wanted to live, but to some extent he longed for that higher plane where there was a single sex, where everyone had the same radiant-blue skin color, where every person was perfectly beautiful in an androgynous blue way, where no one was dumb, no one too smart, where everyone had identical living quarters and wardrobes and footwear, where there was high-quality mineral water and fresh fruit for the asking. He would have to be introduced to everyone he had known in this world, because he wouldn’t recognize them in their new perfect, identical blue bodies. That seemed sad: not to see people as they had been. On the other hand, he wouldn’t want to spend eternity with his dear mother if he had to look at her face all bashed in as it had been just after he had sent her on to that better place.

He tried speaking and found that his voice had returned. “Are you dead, Steven, or are you faking?”

Across the black room, slumped against a black wall, the artist didn’t answer.

“I think they’re gone and won’t be coming back. So if you’re faking, it’s all clear now.”

No reply.

“Well, then you’ve gone over, and all the bad in you was left here. I’m sure you’re full of remorse now and wish you’d been more compassionate toward me. So if you could exert a little of your cosmic power, reach through the veil, and work a little miracle so I can walk again, I believe that would be appropriate.”

The room remained silent.

He still couldn’t feel anything below his neck.

“I hope I don’t need the services of a spirit channeler to get your attention,” Roy said. “That would be inconvenient.”

Silence. Stillness. Cold white light in a tight cone, blazing down through the center of that encapsulating blackness.

“I’ll just wait. I’m sure that reaching through the veil takes a lot of effort.”

Any moment now, a miracle.

* * *

Opening the driver’s door of the pickup, Spencer was suddenly afraid that he had lost the keys. They were in his jacket pocket.

By the time Spencer got behind the wheel and started the engine, Rocky was in the backseat, and Ellie was already in the other front seat. The motel pillow was across her thighs, the laptop was on the pillow, and she was waiting to power up the computer.

When the engine turned over and Ellie switched on the laptop, she said, “Don’t go anywhere yet.”

“We’re sitting ducks here.”

“I’ve got to get back into Godzilla.”

“Godzilla.”

“The system I was in before we got out of the truck.”

“What’s Godzilla?”

“As long as we’re just sitting here, they probably won’t do anything except watch us and wait. But as soon as we start to move, they’ll have to act, and I don’t want them coming at us until we’re ready for them.”

“What’s Godzilla?”

“Ssshhh. I have to concentrate.”

Spencer looked out his side window at the fields and hills. The snow didn’t glow as brightly as it had earlier, because the moon was waning. He had been trained to spot clandestine surveillance in both urban and rural settings, but he could see no signs of the agency observers, though he knew they were out there.

Ellie’s fingers were busy. Keys clicked. Data and diagrams played across the screen.

Focusing on the winterscape once more, Spencer remembered snow forts, castles, tunnels, carefully tamped sled runs. More important: In addition to the physical details of old playgrounds in the snow, he faintly recalled the joy of laboring on those projects and of setting out on those boyhood adventures. Recollections of innocent times. Childhood fantasies. Happiness. They were faint memories. Faint but perhaps recoverable with practice. For a long time, he hadn’t been able to remember even a single moment of his childhood with fondness. The events in that July not only had changed his life forever thereafter but had changed his perception of what his life had been like before the owl, the rats, the scalpel, and the knife.

Sometimes his mother had helped him build castles of snow. He remembered times when she’d gone sledding with him. They especially enjoyed going out after dusk. The night was so crisp, the world so mysterious in black and white. With billions of stars above, you could pretend that the sled was a rocket and you were off to other worlds.

He thought of his mother’s grave in Denver, and he suddenly wanted to go there for the first time since his grandparents had moved him to San Francisco. He wanted to sit on the ground beside her and reminisce about nights when they had gone sledding under a billion stars, when her laughter had carried like music across the white fields.

Rocky stood on the floor in back, paws planted on the front seat, and craned his head forward to lick affectionately at the side of Spencer’s face.

He turned and stroked the dog’s head and neck. “Mr. Rocky Dog, more powerful than a locomotive, faster than a speeding bullet, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound, terror of all cats and Dobermans. Where did that come from, hmmm?” He scratched behind the dog’s ears. Then with his fingertips, he gently explored the crushed cartilage that ensured the left ear would always droop. “Way back in the bad old days, did the person who did this to you look anything like the man back there in the black room? Or did you recognize a scent? Do the evil ones smell alike, pal?” Rocky luxuriated in the attention. “Mr. Rocky Dog, furry hero, ought to have his own comic book. Show us some teeth, give us a thrill.” Rocky just panted. “Come on, show us some teeth,” Spencer said, growling and skinning his lips back from his own teeth. Rocky liked the game, bared his own teeth, and they went grrrrrrr at each other, muzzle to muzzle.

“Ready,” Ellie said.