Trimble frowned. “And how do you know this, Mrs. Gander?”
“Gerry told me.”
“Before he disappeared?”
“Yes. That night.”
Trimble sighed. “The problem is that Gerry Fletcher is no longer available to witness to that. He has disappeared. As has Helen Cordell, whom you contend could have supported your claims against Boyd Fletcher.”
“Helen called me in to handle Gerry. She knew he was one of the kids I counseled on a regular basis.”
“Well, Boyd Fletcher tells a completely different story. A plausible one, I might add.” Shifting in the chair, Trimble placed the pencil precisely on the pad. “I’m afraid we’re going nowhere with this conversation.” “This isn’t the conversation I came here to have,” Megan replied.
“Then why did you come, Mrs. Gander?”
“I need your help.”
Trimble’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “We appear to be at an impasse here, because—quite frankly—I see merit in the accusation Private Fletcher and his wife are making about you and their son.”
“I want to talk about a different matter,” Megan said. “Before we end up with more problems.”
“More problems? We’ve got a hostile city right outside our gate, hundreds of soldiers missing from this post, and confusion raining down from the White House. How could we possibly have even more problems?”
“There are dozens of scared kids at this post, Chaplain.”
Trimble cut in smoothly. “I’m well aware of that. There are also a number of concerned adults.”
Megan thought for a moment, then decided on a different tactic. She needed Trimble on her side. He had the authority to put some kind of plan together. He could help put things back together. If she couldn’t negotiate him past his negative feelings toward her, she needed to at least sidestep them.
“Why do you think all those people vanished?” Megan asked.
After a brief, telling hesitation, Trimble said, “I don’t know. And I don’t think anyone else does yet. Obviously there’s some kind of new superweapon that we’ve not seen the likes of in play.”
“Why couldn’t it be something else? Something that we’ve known was coming but that we are now afraid or reluctant to admit has happened. Or we’re in denial about it.”
Trimble shook his head. “Mrs. Gander, I have no earthly idea what you’re talking about, nor do I have time to waste trying to get you to simply say what is on your mind. I suggest that—”
Megan reached into her briefcase as Trimble spoke. She took out the book on the end times that Bill had left at her house and Jenny had read.
“I’m talking about the Rapture,” Megan said, putting the book on his desk. “I’m talking about the end of the world as we know it. And that’s exactly what has happened here.”
Trimble eyed the book but made no move to reach for it.
“I’m sorry,” Megan said, realizing the mistake she might have inadvertently made. “I don’t know your faith. Maybe you don’t—”
“Oh, come on, Mrs. Gander. I’m a military chaplain. I have a doctorate in divinity from Harvard. Of course I am a Christian,” Trimble declared. “Born and bred. I know all about the Rapture. I’ve written theses on the subject. I daresay I can guarantee that I know more about the subject than you do after reading a book and being inspired by the events of the last few days.” With a forefinger, he pushed the book back toward her. “I’m also quite familiar with this book.”
“You don’t believe that the church will be raptured before the time of the Tribulation?”
“Of course I do.” Trimble settled back in his chair. “Father Kearny and Rabbi Smalls may be of a different opinion in the matter, seeing as how the Catholic and Jewish beliefs don’t reconcile a rapture with the Tribulation in their versions of God’s Word. I believe there will be the Rapture. But this is not it.”
“Given everything that’s happened, how can you say that?”
Trimble frowned. “If the Rapture had occurred, Mrs. Gander, let me assure you that I would have known.”
Then the unspoken truth in Trimble’s reasoning became crystal clear in Megan’s mind, as if someone had suddenly opened the curtains to let the sun in. And Megan felt she knew where that sudden understanding had come from. All at once, she didn’t feel quite so intimidated by this man.
“You don’t believe the Rapture occurred because you’re still here,” she said.
A scowled turned the corners of Trimble’s mouth down and darkened his eyes. “Be careful what you say, Mrs. Gander.”
Megan thought furiously. “Did you know many of the people who disappeared?”
“Several of them, as a matter of fact.”
“What kind of people were they?”
“Mrs. Gander—”
“Are you afraid to answer the question, Chaplain?” Megan knew she’d skated perilously close to the edge. She’d already raised Trimble’s ire. She knew she might just take him past his breaking point. But the truths tumbling from her mouth felt like they were coming from somewhere outside of herself. It was like someone—or Someone—was putting words in her mouth and she had to say them.
Trimble didn’t speak.
“My friends who disappeared,” Megan said, “were all Christians. Devout, loving Christians who held God close in their hearts all the time. They were people who believed in God, who believed that Jesus would be back for them, and who had none of the faith conflicts that I carry with me.” She paused. “My devoutly Christian friends, the ones who trusted God to guide their lives, are gone. And the children, of course—the innocents. Whenever I talk to others about relatives and friends they’ve lost, I keep getting the same descriptions. The missing are innocents and people who believed. People who really believed.” She pinned the chaplain with her gaze. “Have you heard of anyone being taken who didn’t meet that description?”
“Mrs. Gander, I don’t think you—”
“That was a yes-or-no question,” Megan said. Again, it was as though someone else were talking through her. A feeling of righteousness pervaded her. For the moment she felt entirely vindicated in her approach to this man and in the tenacity with which she clung to it.
“What do you
