He looked down at the roll sheet in his hand. 'You're Susan Wing?'
'Yes.' She nodded. 'Sue.'
- 'Well, you're the only one who's actually signed up for: the course.
I did have two other people on the list, but they both cancelled. I was hoping I'd get some walk-it registrants, but I don't think so.' He gave her a wry grin
'Journalism's not the hot draw it was after Watergate.' 'What if no one else shows up?' she asked,
'Then the class is cancelled. We need at least six people to keep a class open.' He looked again at the clock. Three minutes to seven.
'By the way, my name's Rich CarteJ I'm the editor of the R/0 Verde C, azetU. You can call me, Rich.'
Sighing, Sue looked down at her desktop. 'I real[ wanted to take this class.'
'I really wanted to teach this class. I need the extI money.'
'I need the credits. I'm trying to get some of my get eral ed done at Pueblo before I transfer to ASU, but n that many applicable courses are offered.'
Rich walked down the middle aisle, stuck his 'head Of the door, looked both ways. He glanced back up at the clock. 'Seven. I don't think anyone else is coming.'
Sue stood.
'Have your ever taken a journalism class before? Were you on the school newspaper or anything?'
Sue shook her head.
'Well, did you sign up strictly for the GE credits, or are you really interested in journalism?'
'Both.'
'The reason I'm asking is because I can give you some real hands-on journalism experience. We'd be able to kill two birds with one stone.
I just lost one of my reporters, and I need a replacement. You'll get to do a little typesetting, a little paste up a little of everything, learn all pects of the newspaper biz. It'll be part time, of course, but I'll pay you. By the hour or by the column inch, whichever is more.'
'Will I still get credit for the class?'
He laughed. 'Sure. I'll talk to the dean. We'll call it
'Independent Study' or something.'
'Thank you.' .... 'If it's not too presumptuous, may I ask why you're not going to one of the Valley community colleges for your general ed?
It seems kind of backward to just wait around until Pueblo offers transferable courses. You might have to wait for years.'
Sue reddened. 'I have no choice. We can't afford anything else.'
Rich nodded. 'I hear you.' He looked at her. 'Don't you work at that Chinese restaurant?' 'My family owns it,' she admitted.
'I thought so.' He pulled a piece of paper from the pad beneath his roll sheet and wrote something down. 'Here,' he said, handing her the paper. 'This is the number of the paper. Give me a call tomorrow morning around ten or so, and we'll set something up.' 'Okay.'
'I'll talk to you tomorrow, then.'
Sue started toward the door, saw the night outside, black in contrast to the light of the classroom. She turned back toward Rich. 'Are you leaving now too?'
He shook his head. 'I'm required to stay here until twenty after, just in case someone else shows up.'
'Well, I'll see you later, then.' She swallowed, her heart pounding, and forced her feet to carry her through the door.
Outside, it wasn't that bad. Other classrooms were lit: and there were plenty of late students and teachers walking around. She hazarded a glance toward the darkened other half of the school, and goose bumps popped up on her arms. It seemed stupid now to tell anyone what she'd seen, or to even hint that she'd seen anything, but the fear was still there.
She ran through the lighted parking lot to the station wagon.
She did not relax until the school was receding in he rearview mirror.
Pastor Wheeler was awake the second time Jesus appeared.
He was locking the door of the vestibule for the evening when he sensed a subtle change in the quality of the air. It seemed suddenly easier to breathe, and his head felt light, open, as though all oppressiveness and negativity had been lifted from his mind, and the full potential of his thoughts was suddenly allowed to flower freely and unrestrained within his brain.
He turned around but saw nothing there, only the empty pews in their parallel rows, the last of the afternoon sun glowing in weak rainbows around the edges of the stained glass windows.
He turned around again
And there was Jesus.
The Savior was standing in front of the altar in all of His glory, gazing up at the cross that hung above the pulpit, the cross that the pastor had found rotting in the desert near Goldfield and had refinished himself. Wheeler held his breath, not daring to move. He gazed, transfixed, at the back of Jesus' head, at His long, gorgeous reddish brown hair. Pride was a sin, Wheeler knew, but he felt proud nevertheless, knowing that the Savior would be pleased with his efforts. The cross had been constructed from discarded railroad ties, and the wood had been weatherworn and faded nearly white when he'd found it outside the ghost town, the whorled grain dried and raised by exposure into ridges. He had dragged the cross over his shoulder, as Jesus had, only through the desert to his car instead of through the streets to Golgotha. Days and nights he'd spent sanding the cross, finishing it, coating it with the finest oils, and when it was finished, he'd known that it was something special. He'd known that it was good.
He had been preaching in Phoenix at that time, had moved twice since, but the cross had remained a constant in his life and had always accompanied him.
Now Jesus turned to him, smiling, and Wheeler felt an ecstatic pride swell within his breast. 'You have created a thing of beauty,' Christ said. His voice filled the air of the silent church like music, caressing the empty space between the beams in the peaked roof, falling gracefully down to spread lightly through the lower haft of the chapel.
'Men will volunteer to be crucified on your cross. Women will plead to be allowed to b nailed on such wood.' i
'Yes,' Wheeler whispered. He stood unmoving as the warmth of rapture flooded through him. The feeling in real life was much stronger than it had been in his vision and much more immediate, a physical sense of extraordinary well-being that spread throughout his body, manifesting itself in his head, in his heart, his fingers and toes. It was a feeling like no other, and he knew with utter certainty that it was not something that could be duplicated by drugs or sex or any human-generated states of euphoria. It could only be found in the presence of the Lord.
'You have heeded my words,' Jesus said. 'But there is still much that needs to be done.'
There was something both great and terrible in the countenance of Christ as He spoke, and though it was sublimated and subdued, translated for his benefit into human terms, Wheeler could, sense the awesome power of God in the arrangement of those familiar features. As before, there were questions he wanted to ask, things he wanted to know. But also as before, the impulse was quashed, and he was intimidated into silence by the Savior's presence.
Jesus nodded His understanding. 'All of your questions will be answered,' He said. Tears of gratitude filled the pastor's eyes.
'Thank you.' Jesus smiled again, and His smile brightened the interior of the darkening church with the light of goodness. He gestured with one graceful hand toward the world outside the stained glass windows.
'This town is home to sin. It is filled with evildoers. It must be cleansed before it can become host to the house of the Lord. It must be cleansed with the blood of the guilty.'
Information flooded into Wheeler's brain, the totality of the concepts that Jesus only touched upon with His words, each course of action instantly magnified and clarified. Wheeler saw tortured faces, scarred and scored and bleeding, contributing to the greater glory of God with the pure and exquisite beauty of their deaths. He saw gracefully severed heads and arms, artfully eviscerated torsos, streams of corrupted blood flowing into a river of
