Then the servers called security, and security men came out of a back room and grabbed both women from behind.
It bothered me very much that they took both women away. The fat crazy woman had been permitted to go about her business until someone resisted. Then both victim and victimizer were treated as equally guilty.
It bothered me even more that the women were not thrown out. They were taken away. Where? They didn't come back. No one I spoke to knew what had happened to them.
Most troubling of all, I recognized one of the security men. He had been at Acorn. He had been one of our 'teachers' there. I had seen him take Adela Ortiz away to rape her. I could shut my eyes and see him dragging her off to the cabin he used. There had to be many such men still alive and free—men who were not at Camp Christian when we took back our freedom, then took our revenge. But this was the first one that I had seen.
My fear and my hate returned full force and all but choked me. It took all my self-control to sit still, eat my food, and go on being the lump I had to seem to be. Day Turner had been collared after a fight that he said he had had nothing to do with. Christian America officials made themselves judges, juries, and, when they chose to be, executioners. They didn't waste any effort trying to be fair. I had heard on one of my earlier visits that the all-male CA Center Security Force was made up of retired and off-duty cops. That, if it were true, was terrifying. It made me all the more certain that I was right not to go to the police with the true story of what had been done to me and to Acorn. Hell, I hadn't even been able to get my own brother to believe me. What chance would I have to convince the cops if some of them were working for CA?
After dinner, after the sermon, I managed to make myself go up to one of the servers—a blond woman with a long red scar on her forehead. She was one of the few who laughed and talked with us as she scooped stew into bowls and passed out bread. I asked her to give my note to lay minister Marcos Duran. As it happened, she knew him.
'He's not here anymore,' she said. 'He was transferred to Portland.'
'Oregon?' I asked, and then felt stupid. Of course she meant Portland, Oregon.
'Yeah,' the server said. 'He left a few days ago. He was offered a chance to do more preaching at our new center in Portland, and he's always wanted that What a nice man. We were sorry to lose him. Did you ever hear him preach?'
'A couple of times,' I said. 'Are you sure he's gone?'
'Yeah. We had a party for him. He'll be a great minister someday. A great minister. He's so spiritual.' She sighed.
Maybe 'spiritual' is another word for fantastically good-looking in her circles. Anyway, he was gone. Instead of helping me find Larkin or even seeing me again, he had gone.
I thanked the server and headed out into the evening toward the home of the 88-year-old man where I was still staying. I had left my spare clothing and my sleepsack in his garage. For once, I was traveling light My backpack was half-empty. I walked automatically, not thinking about where I was going. I was wondering whether I could reach Marc again, wondering whether it would do me any good to reach him. What would he do if I showed up in Portland? Run for Seattle? Why had he run, anyway? I wouldn't have hurt him—wouldn't have said or done anything that could damage his lay-minister reputation. Did he run because I mentioned Cougar? Maybe it had been a mistake for me to tell him what happened to us, to Acorn. Maybe I should have told him the same thing I had told the police. 'Well, I was walking north on U.S. 101, heading for Eureka, and these guys…..'
Was it so essential for him to be important in CA that he didn't care what vicious things CA was doing, didn't care even what CA did to the only family he had left?
Then there was a man looming in front of me—a huge man, tall and broad and wearing a CA Center Security uniform. I stopped just before I would have slammed into him. I jumped back. My impulse was to run like hell. This guy looked scary enough to make anyone run. But the truth was, I was frozen with fear. I couldn't move. I just stared up at him.
He put a huge hand inside his uniform jacket, and I had a flash of it coming out holding a gun—not that this guy needed a gun to kill me. He was a giant.
But his hand came out of his jacket holding an envelope—a little white paper envelope like the kind mail used to come in. Back when we lived in Robledo my father sometimes brought home paper mail from the college in such envelopes.
'Reverend Duran said to give this to anyone tall and Black and asking for him by name,' the giant said. He had a soft, quiet voice that made his appearance less threatening somehow. 'Looks like you qualify,' he finished.
I had to make myself reach out and take the envelope.
