Absence of Faith (23 page)

"Here," he said. "For your
trouble."

"Thanks, Mr. Jones. Anything else
you need, just let me know!" the young man said.

"There is one thing...just don't
spread it around that I'm breeding. You know, I don't want the
competition to get wind of it," he said.

"Sure, Mr. Jones, I know," the
youth said.

The overweight man was winded by
the time he reached his car. He opened the rear door on the
passenger side, and then walked around and opened the rear door on
the driver's side. He backed into the car and secured the leashes
onto one seat belt, then dragged the dogs into the car, moving out
of the car as he pulled the leashes. He shortened the lengths of
the leashes by attaching them to another seat belt. The dogs sat in
the back seat, and the short leashes prevented them from moving
forward or jumping into the front seat. The Magus closed the car
doors and drove away. The dogs barked at every passerby. When they
were not barking they snarled and growled as if they knew who their
new master was and what he had planned for them.

The Magus turned onto Route 35 and
headed towards his house. The dogs became more excited as the car
increased speed. They struggled desperately to get free and
strained their necks to get out of the collars, occasionally
letting out horse coughs. The Magus occasionally looked back at
them through the rear view mirror. A few moments later, the dogs
were silent. The Magus turned up the radio. Mozart's fifth symphony
was playing on one of the classical music stations broadcast from
New York. He placed his arm across the top of the bench seat and
enjoyed the music. A few moments later, the Magus heard the dogs
breathe in deeply and then growl. Suddenly, his arm burned in pain
- a piercing pain so intense his vision blurred. He turned to look,
but he knew before he looked what had happened. He was filled with
horror - one of the dogs had gotten free and was ripping his
forearm to pieces with its crushing jaw and razor-sharp teeth. The
Magus pulled his arm away, but the dog hung on ripping more flesh
as he tugged. He saw his ivory shirt turn crimson as his blood
soaked into the material. He instantly brought his other arm up and
made a fist aimed straight at the dog's head, but he was never able
to follow through with the punch. The other dog jumped up, and with
a single bite grabbed hold of the Magus throat, and ripped. Blood
showered the windshield and the dashboard. The Magus slumped down
in the seat his life ebbing away with each heartbeat. His foot held
the accelerator and the car veered off the road into an open field
and continued accelerating like a wild comet. The comet slammed
into a large oak tree cutting the car nearly in half. The front end
crumbled like tin foil and the engine and transmission were pushed
into the front seat. The massive engine pinned the Magus between it
and seat, nearly severing his limp body in two at the waist. The
windshield shattered spewing tiny, red clumps of glass everywhere.
The glass looked like rubies in the mid-afternoon sun as they
shimmered in the peaceful grass. A small fire started in the
carburetor and began to ignite the fluffy insulation lining on the
underside of the crumpled hood. Smoke oozed from under the wreckage
as the fire burned steadily and stronger. The dogs, sensing the
fire, quickly squeezed out of the car though the shattered
windshield and vanished into the nearby woods. An old, white-haired
woman stepped out of her tiny house nearby and surveyed the
wreckage. She ran back into house and called the police.

The fire ignited a clump of dry
leaves under the car and soon the front tires were ablaze pushing
out billows of black smoke like two giant chimneys from a
turn-of-the-century factory. The flames joined the others inside
the car. Within minutes, the interior was glowing orange as the
flames appeared like bright orange serpents trying to escape out of
the glassless windows. A police car and an ambulance arrived, along
with a fire truck. The firefighters jumped off the truck and
scrambled to get a hose out and pumping. One moved too close with
the waterless hose and an angry billow of fire roared out of the
window nearly swallowing the young firefighter. His hair and
eyebrows were singed. The dogs watched from the woods; they seemed
to be smiling.

* * *

Stokes was enjoying the sunset on
his enclosed porch and reading the last chapter of
Sankara Saranam
’s
God Without Religion,
when
the phone rang. The last hint of the golden orange sun disappeared
and a gray pale was beginning to shroud the last light of the
day.

"Hello, this is Doctor
Stokes."

"Doctor Stokes, this is Doctor
Hillgren from Riverdale Medical Center ER. We have one of
yours...just came in. His name is Henry Graber..."

"Is he all right? What
happened?"

"A car accident. He didn't have a
chance..."

Stokes was silent.

"Hello, Doctor Stokes? Are you
still there?"

"Yeah...he was a good friend,"
Stokes said in a near whisper.

"I'm sorry. What did you
say?"

"How did it happen?"

"We're not sure, yet. The body was
pretty well burned."

"Burned? What happened?" Stokes
asked.

"His car struck a tree on Route 35.
Could have had a heart attack."

"Oh, no!"

"I'll keep you informed when I know
more," Dr. Hillgren said.

"Please do. Has his wife been
told?"

"I don't know. The police usually
take care of that."

"Sure."

Stokes went back into the living
room, sat down and cried. He had known Henry Graber most of his
life. Their children had played together, swam together on the
beach and enjoyed summer cookouts. Mary entered with her unfinished
quilt and a wicker sewing basket with pieces of wicker sticking
out. When she saw Stokes' face, she dropped the basket and went to
him. Stokes looked up at her through a blur of tears and fetched a
pad and pencil to make sure she didn’t read his lips incorrectly
and wrote,

"Henry Graber is dead. Killed in a
car accident...just this afternoon."

Mary's face constricted and tears
ran down her face. She wrapped her arms around her husband and they
cried together. Stokes wrote on the pad again.

"I'm going to Riverdale; I want to
be there. He was a good friend."

Mary nodded.

As Stokes drove to the medical
center, he had to keep wiping his eyes to see where he was going.
He entered the hospital through its emergency entrance and had to
push his way inside. There were lines formed outside.

"What's going on, here?" he asked
one of the fleeing interns.

"I don't know," he said.

Stokes went to the main reception
area, where several nurses and doctors rushed back and forth trying
to keep up with increasing number of patients.

"Does anyone know what's going on?"
he asked.

A petite nurse sitting behind the
counter looked up.

"No sir," she said. "Can I help
you?"

"I'm Doctor Stokes from Ocean
Village and I'd like to know what's going on here?"

"Your guess is as good as ours,"
she explained. "It's been like this for the past two days.
Everybody with the slightest ailment is here and they all have the
same excuse, that if they die they will go to hell and they want to
make sure they stay healthy as long as they can. These people are
totally paranoid of dying. It has something to do with that priest
dying over in Ocean Village and the Satanist cult," she
explained.

"Who's in charge of the ER
tonight?" Stokes asked.

"Doctor Hillgren. His office is
down that hall; first door on the left," she said. "But I don't
think you'll find him there. He's running around like the rest of
us."

Stokes darted away and pushed open
two swinging doors that led into the examining rooms of the ER. He
began to gasp for air. He rushed to each examining room asking for
Doctor Hillgren. Panting, Stokes dragged himself into a room at the
end of a long corridor and abruptly pulled the curtain aside.
Stokes saw a sandy-haired doctor placing a stethoscope on an old
women's chest. Two nurses stood next to the doctor.

"Hold on! Who are you?" the doctor
shouted at Stokes. "What are you doing here?"

"Forgive me...I'm Doctor Stokes
from Ocean Village. I'm looking for Doctor Hillgren," Stokes said
between gasps.

"That's me. Close the curtain and
wait for me outside," Doctor Hillgren said turning back to the old
woman.

A few minutes later, Hillgren
approached Stokes in the corridor. Stokes was still gasping for
air.

"What's the matter? Sit down. Take
it easy," Hillgren said.

"I'm just very concerned," Stokes
said between gasps.

"It's all those people in the ER,
isn't it?" Hillgren said. "I'll bet it’s that opportunity-seeking
maniac that’s been on the news that has riled them up."

"It's not some maniac! I'll tell
you," Stokes said still gasping for air.

"You know, I also noticed a rise in
the number of abortions," Hillgren said. "It could be related to
that Satanist cult."

"Oh, Lord. Not that,
too!"

"You think it’s related,
too?"

"No, no. It’s not that. There’s
more to it," Stokes said.

"There is?"

"Absolutely."

"Fill me in while we walk to the
morgue."

The two men took a nearby elevator
down to the basement. Stokes filled Hillgren in the details of the
events, which had led to the chaos. Hillgren listened, but had no
reaction.

"You have an increase in
abortions?" Stokes asked.

"Yes. They send us their overflow
or any that might lead to complications," Hillgren
explained.

"Who?"

"Family Planning."

"Can you find out why there's been
an increase?"

"I can call the clinic later,"
Hillgren said.

The men stood in silence for a few
moments.

"Do you really believe this Satan
stuff?" Hillgren asked.

"I don't know," Stokes said. "When
fourteen clergy from every denomination in the county get together
and talk about it with hopes of finding a solution, maybe there's a
problem."

"You don't say," Hillgren replied
rubbing his golden moustache. "I've seen this kind of panic
before."

"You have?"

"Sure. When the media announced the
discovery of AIDS, when the temperature goes up to 90 for three
days straight and a few seniors die of heat stroke, suddenly the ER
room is flooded with people complaining of everything from a
headache to the common cold, and they all swear they are going to
die from it," Hillgren explained.

"This is different..." Stokes said.
"This goes far deeper than people dying of heat strokes. People
believe they have lost their religion. Religion gives people hope,
a destiny, a future, something to look forward to, a goal to
achieve, a mountain to climb and all of that is being taken away by
this strange disease we can't get a handle on," Stokes
explained.

"See, even you believe it's a
disease and not this crazy Satan business!"

"It doesn't matter whether it's a
disease, a plague or an epidemic. What they believe is happening is
what's important. Their reality is phenomenological and until we
can prove otherwise, this craziness is going to get worse...a lot
worse," Stokes said his voice shaking.

"Phenomenological?"

"Seeing is believing. Perception
is reality. If they experienced it, they believe it
happened."

They entered a narrow corridor with
cinder-blocked walls enameled with hospital green paint. The floors
were covered with gray enamel speckled with dings that revealed the
naked cement under it. They walked a short distance and the
corridor widened. The florescent lights cast a cold, frosty hue on
everything. Hillgren turned right and pushed two double swinging
doors open. A thin young intern with dark skin and short hair met
the two. The man's eyes were bloodshot and his white shirt was
wrinkled.

"Hello, I'm Doctor Stokes. I'm here
to see...Henry Graber."

The man turned and walked to a gray
metal desk that looked like someone used it for a temper tantrum.
The sides were dented and scratched. He picked up a clipboard from
the tired desk, and then looked up at Stokes.

"Number 610A. Pretty bad. Just came
in," the young intern said.

"Thanks."

Doctors Stokes and Hillgren scanned
the numbers on the large silver drawers until they found 610A.
Stokes pulled the drawer open revealing the smooth black body bag
and quickly unzipped it. The two men stepped back. Hillgren coughed
several times. What remained of Graber was a mass of blackened bone
and skin. The skin was flaky and hugged the bones like
shrink-wrap.

"It's hard to believe that this was
once a living human being," Hillgren said.