Deadline (14 page)

“Who but Elyon understands everything? To expect to understand everything is to expect to be God.”

On earth, Zyor’s piercing logic would have seemed incriminating, laying guilt on the questioner. Here it served to enlighten Finney without accusing him.

“But,” Finney explained, “Elyon’s Word tells us that while on earth we saw in a mirror dimly, in heaven we would see face to face. That we used to know in part, but in heaven we would know fully. Isn’t this heaven? Then why is my understanding still so…partial?”

“You see much more clearly, my master, because the obstacles that blurred your vision are now removed. Your mind is sharper and able to focus. But you do not see all there is to see. Did you not also read in Elyon’s Book his promise that in the coming ages he will continuously reveal to us the incomparable riches of his grace? How then could you expect to know everything there is to know? Or to know immediately everything you will one day know? This would defy the way of process and discovery designed by Elyon for his creatures.”

The angel’s voice trembled with excitement, suggesting to Finney he was but skimming a vast reservoir of truth. Even as Zyor spoke, Finney sensed him reveling in doing that for which he was created—making known to men the ways of God.

“Elyon is the Creator, we are the creatures, and always shall be. Heaven does not make you inhuman. It allows you to become all it means to be human. The Creator knows all, and knows all at once. The creature’s knowledge is and always will be both partial and gradual. It will grow continuously throughout eternity. Every day we will understand better the greatness of our King, and the multifaceted wonders of his character. In this way we will worship him with a keener awareness and vitality. With a freshness that comes not only from considering what we already know about him, but anticipating what we do not yet know. And while our knowledge will one day be many times what it is now, even then we will be no closer to exhausting the riches of his person. He is as worthy now as he will be then, but we will worship him anew because we will have learned more of his worthiness than we ever knew before.”

Pulled in the wake of the angel’s excitement, Finney responded, “Of course. It makes sense when I hear you say it. For some reason I thought process and growth were part of the other world, and it would be different here—that everything we’d ever experience in heaven would be ours immediately.”

“And then what?” Zyor asked.

“Well, then we’d just keep enjoying it forever, I suppose.”

“Without the joy of discovery? With no meditation and study? No interaction with Elyon or one’s fellow creatures? No process of revelation and learning? No exploration of Elyon’s realm that rewards us with enlightenment and renews our thirst for further adventure? With no effort?” The thought was obviously as impoverishing to the angel as it was incomprehensible.

Though Finney knew Zyor meant nothing personal, for a moment he felt as close as he had, in the new world, to having asked a stupid question.

“Well, yes, Zyor, I have to admit I did think that.”

The great wise warrior seemed genuinely perplexed. “I do not understand why. And I certainly cannot imagine anyone would want such a thing. Learning requires curiosity, exploration, evaluation, and dialogue. To be granted the product of knowledge without this process would violate what it means to be a creature. It would circumvent the process of growth in the grace and knowledge of our Lord…may his name be ever praised.

“If we knew all,” Zyor continued, “for us there could be no growth. Mystery is the food of the creature’s mind. Your people love to read their mysteries, but most of them do not devote their attention to the grand mysteries of the universe, the mysteries rooted in the Creator himself. If we understood all the mysteries of Elyon, our wonder would be focused on a knowledge that had a past but no future. Each moment of discovery, each event of disclosure and understanding is a point of worship, a point of wondrous arrival for the moment. But that point of arrival is not the ultimate destination. It is but one more step on the stairway, one more rock on which we tread in crossing the water…” Finney thought he noticed a gleam in Zyor’s eye as he added, “just as when you were a child, and stepped on one rock after another to cross Benton Stream.”

Benton Stream! What a flood of memories it brought back. Finney’s spine tingled as he was reminded again this magnificent being had been there by his side even as a child, when he was growing up in the other world.

“Elyon said in his Book you must enter heaven as a little child. Despite your continuous growth here, in relation to the Father you shall always be a child. And while on earth a child may long to grow old, and an adult may long to be a child again, here you are able to mature without ever losing the wonder of being a child. Indeed, in maturing you become more child-like. For the child’s joy here is in the discovery of each step, and knowing that while we have for the moment completed our quest, the larger quest will go on and on. Each cave we enter to explore opens into new passageways, which enter into others, and others. Our delight is not only in being at the place we are, but in knowing the Adventure will never end, and therefore the Joy will never end. Indeed, both the Adventure and the Joy are just now beginning. And,” Zyor paused for a moment and looked toward Elyon’s throne, “when the great nebula of Orion grows dim with age, when the star systems of Andromeda collapse upon themselves and breathe no more, the Adventure will still be young.”

Set free by each new revelation of truth, Finney’s mind probed the subtle implications of all this in a way his old mind couldn’t have begun to. The angel continued to instruct, and Finney sat at his feet as an eager pupil, wildly inscribing notes on the clean slate of his new mind.

“Even among the creatures of heaven,” Zyor said, “knowledge is not equal. Michael and Gabriel know things I cannot now imagine. But someday I will grow to their present understanding. Meanwhile they will grow to an understanding of which they now can only dream. Yet the Seraphim know things they do not, or so I have been told. Just as I can know things you cannot. And, indeed, as you know things I cannot.”

This last statement astonished Finney. Zyor had been created ages before him and had been with Finney from conception to death, in all of his conversations and experiences and classrooms. What could he possibly know that this great and wise being did not? But Zyor was going on, so Finney had to file this with all the other questions that were adding up faster than the answers, which were coming at a torrid pace. Finney could only praise Elyon for his improved mind, which seemed as far advanced beyond the old as a computer beyond an abacus.

“I am old in my knowledge, so old that in comparison you are but a newborn child,” Zyor said, with no hint of arrogance or condescension. “Yet when my knowledge is compared to Elyon’s, it is no different than yours, no different than if I had been born this very moment. The difference between us is a difference in degree. The difference between us and him is a difference in kind. Only he is Creator. All others are creatures. We are the worshippers. He alone, the Ancient of Days, is the one to be worshipped.”

Zyor’s voice took on a hushed awe, as if what he was about to say was more important than anything, and must be said and heard with only the greatest care.

“He bridged the gulf of a broken relationship between himself and you—may the Lamb of God be forever praised—but the gulf between his capacities and ours shall always be infinite. We can never know but the tiniest fraction of what he knows. The fraction would seem to increase with the knowledge, but a fraction of an infinite amount will always be infinitely small in relation to the whole. We will increase in knowledge throughout eternity, always learning as he reveals himself and his wonders to us. But we will never begin to catch up with his knowledge. The most educated, insightful creature is still only a creature. The most he can know is but a drop of water in Elyon’s infinite ocean of truth.”

“So, we’ll always be learning and exploring,” Finney said. “Doesn’t sound like we’ll be bored.”

Zyor gazed at Finney, as puzzled as his placid face could look.

“Boredom? Here? It is…unthinkable. Heaven is the very opposite of boredom. It puts one in the presence of the Beloved himself, and of multitudes of beloved ones. Lovers are never bored, for their delight is in each other. Even if no other diversions are available, the study of each other is enough. He who loves Elyon could never be bored in his presence. You shall not merely stare at Elyon here, as one might stare at a picture of his beloved in the dark world. You shall investigate Elyon’s very being, and the delights of doing so are beyond comprehension. If that was all heaven is, it would be infinitely more than enough.

“Yet because our Beloved takes delight in always designing and creating new things to display his wonders, this realm is an endless repository of wealth, a continuous succession of adventures to benefit and delight his children. Boredom? There is only boredom where man would be sovereign instead of God, gutting the world of wonder and leaving no riches to treasure and no realms to explore. On earth there is boredom. In eternity there shall be no boredom, except in hell.”

Zyor reached down and put his arm around Finney’s shoulder. Finney sensed somehow it was not a natural gesture for the angel, but an expression of affection he’d learned from humans in his many years on earth.

“It is time to travel and explore the wonders of this place. On earth you needed exercise and diversion and fresh air to allow your insights to assimilate. Something similar is true here. Your capacity to understand has grown hundreds of times, but it is only the beginning.”

Zyor smiled in the almost-human way of one privileged to initiate someone to an experience of joy and delight.

“I have much to show you about what is happening on earth, where Elyon’s plan is at work. About how your own death, and the circumstances surrounding it, is affecting the life of someone you have prayed for many years. But first, come with me. I will introduce you to an undiscovered country that awaits your exploration. You will be the child, and I will show you wonders beyond your wildest dreams.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

I
t wasn’t an accident.” Jake pondered the message in bewildered disbelief. Was this someone’s idea of a joke? Bad taste, sure, but bad taste was nothing new, not in his mail anyway. What else could “it” be besides the accident that killed his friends? He checked the postmark. Two days after the accident. If that’s what it really was. Who sent this, and why? Someone he’d offended with a column? Maybe a right-wing fanatic? They were capable of this sort of thing. Or maybe politics had nothing to do with it. Just a disturbed person wanting to intimidate a public figure but without the guts to accost him on the street. Or maybe it was someone sincere but mistaken. Or maybe it was true.

If it was true, how did this person know? Who was it? The postmark was the same downtown zip as the
Trib
, which meant nothing. Anyone could have mailed it here. Why didn’t the writer identify himself? Was he at risk? Someone who accidentally witnessed something? Or overheard something? Or was it someone on the inside? If so, the inside of what?

Jake reprimanded himself for being suckered into this. It was a prank, and the perpetrator had succeeded. But he had to check it out.

Where do I begin? Two words came to mind.
Ollie Chandler
.

Jake befriended Chandler, a cop, five years ago when he was up on a police brutality charge. Several reporters at the
Trib
had hung Ollie out to dry, convicted him before the jury ever heard any evidence. It bugged Jake. He did some investigating on his own and got a very different picture of Chandler. He was a Vietnam vet, and Jake felt an immediate loyalty to him. The other reporters made an issue of his being ex-military—they’d said he came from a “background of violence” and was “accustomed” to it. Perhaps “life was cheaper” to him. Jake stood by Ollie as he would a buddy in the trenches. He even suggested in a column that perhaps life was cheaper to those who had never had to lay theirs down for others. This hadn’t won him points at the
Trib
.

The jury finally acquitted Chandler and he was reinstated to the force. Some credited Jake’s investigation and sympathetic portrayal for preventing him from being made a scapegoat. Taken off a street beat, Ollie made the switch from uniformed officer to detective, homicide detective, something he’d always wanted to do anyway. He and Jake shared information. Every journalist needed one detective he could trust. Every detective needed one journalist he could trust. Jake and Ollie had found each other.

Jake tossed a dollar by his plate and stuffed the letters in his briefcase, slipping the yellow note card back in its envelope and putting it in the upper fold of his briefcase.

The police station was only six blocks away. Jake meandered in the front door, unconsciously squaring his shoulders as if reporting for duty.
Safest place in the city
, he thought. He didn’t share the cynicism about police officers that permeated some circles at the
Trib.
Maybe because he’d been a soldier doing the dirty work of protecting his country, and he could only respect people who put their lives on the line daily. Of course, he knew there were dirty cops, just like there were dirty soldiers. But he always began by assuming they were clean, and that made all the difference. He was one of the few reporters whose face was a welcome sight at the bureau.

Some days any visitor had direct access to the central precinct elevators. It always amazed Jake when he could go straight up the elevator and walk unimpeded right into the office of the chief of police. Other times, like today, they’d roped off the lobby, and you had to check in at the main desk before getting through to the elevators.

A thirtyish woman in blue uniform put down the front desk phone and asked, “May I help you?” A flash of recognition. “Oh, Jake Woods. Hi! I love your column—usually, anyway.” She grinned. “Got an interview with the Chief or somebody?”

“Not an interview. Not even an appointment. Something important just came up. I need to see Ollie Chandler.”

“Just saw him come back from lunch, hot dog in hand. Let me check his office.” She pressed a button and spoke into the headset microphone. “Detective Chandler? Jake Woods is here to see you. By himself. He says he doesn’t have an appointment, but was hoping…Yeah, sure. I’ll tell him.”

She pushed the button and gave Jake the nod. “Detective Chandler says”—suddenly her voice was deep and raspy—“Jake Woods doesn’t need an appointment. Send him up, but tell him the hot dog is mine—he can stop at the vending machines if he’s hungry.”

“Nice impersonation,” Jake acknowledged. He always kidded Ollie about his habit of eating out of the fourteenth floor vending machines with their “Steak sub with pizza sauce” delicacies that looked like they’d been created just before the pyramids.

“Fourteenth floor. I guess you know that. Any elevator but the first one.”

“Thanks.” Jake walked to the elevators on his right, getting nods of recognition from a few uniformed officers standing around chatting. He noticed a veteran telling a young cop who he was. It felt good. He stepped in the elevator, which gave him only five options despite the building’s sixteen floors. Floors two and three were courtrooms, four to eleven were jail space, both accessible only from the other side of the building. Twelfth floor, his first option, was ID, Intelligence, Juvenile, and Narcotics. Thirteenth floor (yes there was one) housed Internal Investigations, the D.A.’s office and a hodgepodge of smaller departments. Fourteenth, the button he pushed, was the detective floor. Above it was the Chief of Police’s office, the media room, and the police museum.

Jake hadn’t seen Ollie on his turf for six months. The display photos, the first thing he saw when the elevator door opened, had changed. They featured six bright shiny photos of detectives at work. One was Ollie, who looked decidedly uncomfortable posing for this “natural” shot. Jake chuckled.

Almost everyone was plain clothes on this floor, so Jake didn’t stand out. Unlike every other floor, which allowed free access to hallways, detective division had only one place the general public could go, the reception desk, with a thick bullet-proof window but no accessible door. You didn’t just go in. Someone had to come out for you.

Jake gave his name to the receptionist, who picked up the phone and motioned him to sit and wait. Two minutes later Ollie came through the lone door on the far end of the floor and motioned to him.

“Jake! Come on in. Want a bite of my dog?” Ollie asked the question just as he popped the last remaining inch in his mouth, followed by a “that was delicious” expression and a big swig of Coke from the giant-sized red cup. Jake smiled because Ollie’s raspy basement voice had been so perfectly captured by the girl at the front desk.

“No thanks, Ollie. Just had a sandwich down at the deli.”

“Still hang out there, huh? I’ve looked for you a few times. I always figure when I’m chowing down you’re over there churning out a column. By the time you’re ready to enjoy your afternoon, I’m back keeping the city safe so civilians like you can walk the streets.”

“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”

Ollie wrinkled his nose thoughtfully and retorted, “A rolling stone gathers no moss.”

“A stitch in time saves nine.”

“Hell knows no fury like a woman scorned.” Both laughed.

They walked through or by all the major detective divisions—Robbery, Sex Crimes, Child Abuse, Fraud, Burglary, Auto, Pawn Shop Detail, all the way to the far end, where Ollie worked in Homicide. This place always fascinated the investigator in Jake, the tireless researcher who loved to solve problems and find answers. Sometimes he envied Ollie’s career.

They wandered through a maze of desks back to Ollie’s, as far away from the front desk as it could possibly be. He had a great view of the city, but to Ollie it was “just a bunch of buildings.” Chandler excavated a spiral notebook from his desk, buried under piles of papers and notebooks.

“Like my new desk?”

“Don’t know, Ollie. Can’t see it. Come to think of it, never saw the old one either.” Actually, it looked remarkably like half the desks at the
Trib
, including his own.

“Well, if I take the time to clean it off I figure that’s a few more hours for one of the slime balls I’m chasing to blow away somebody else.”

“So your messy desk is saving lives, is that what you’re telling me?”

“You got it. Hey, the lieutenant’s office is empty all day. It’ll give us more privacy.” Ollie waved him to follow.

They walked past the open door of an unused interview room where suspects were brought in from the custody elevator. That elevator, which could be opened only with a special key, went to and from this floor and the jail. Jake glanced at the stark room, with nothing on the wall, where Ollie had shaken down hundreds of suspects over the years, often playing good cop/bad cop with his partner Steve. While most guys seemed made for one role or the other, Ollie prided himself in his skills both as “bad cop,” intimidating and threatening the suspect, or “good cop,” becoming the suspect’s advocate, getting Steve to calm down or back off, and becoming the listening ear when the guy was willing to talk. Even with all the play this had been given in the movies, Ollie once told Jake, crooks still fell for it all the time.

The lieutenant’s office, eight feet deep, ten feet wide, was the alter ego to Ollie’s workspace—neat as a pin, uncluttered, a single painting on the entire left wall, two posters on the right one, nothing behind the desk, and the front consisting of a big window overlooking the homicide department. No candy wrappers or donut boxes. No signs of life.

Ollie took the lieutenant’s chair, and waved Jake to one of the two chairs across the desk. He eyed Jake and cleared his throat. Jake braced himself for what he knew was coming.

“Listen, Jake, I’m…I’m really sorry about your buddies, Finney and the other guy, the surgeon. Doc? Yeah, Doc. I know how close you were.”

“Yeah, thanks.”

“There’s no friend like an old friend. They were good men.”

“They were. I…miss them,” Jake choked. For some reason he could talk about it to Ollie. He wasn’t sure why, but he knew it had something to do with the fact they shared in common an Asian jungle on the other side of the world, a jungle that had no place in the lives of Elaine and Joe and Jerry and Sandy and most of the other people he knew.

“What’s up, bro? I don’t ever remember you dropping in without calling. Not that I mind. What can I do for you?”

Jake opened his briefcase and handed him the envelope, without comment. Ollie handled it by its edges only, turned it carefully, front and back, eyed the postmark, then puffed open the envelope enough to let the yellow card slide out to two fingers of his other hand, which firmly but oh-so-carefully pressed on the cards edges. He showed the skill and care of a surgeon or a jewelry cutter, neither of which fit Ollie’s rough and tumble image. He read the card under his breath.

“It wasn’t an accident.” He looked confused for a moment, then flashed his eyes at Jake. “The car accident? Your friends?”

“I don’t know what else,” Jake said. “It could be a tasteless joke. Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“What’s your gut-level feeling?”

“I’m not sure. What’s yours?”

“Well, we’ve got to check it out. Immediately, while there’s still something to look at. The first seventy-two hours are critical, and we’re way past that now.”

Ollie pulled a clear plastic evidence bag out of a drawer and gingerly placed the envelope and card in it. Then he scribbled something illegible with a black marker.

“Where’s the car? A wrecking yard, I assume.”

“I don’t even know.”

“Yeah, it’d be in a yard unless anything was suspect at the time, or there was a death. Then it would have been taken to the police garage. But this is the first sign of foul play, right?”

“Right, as far as I know.” It unnerved Jake for Ollie to take this so seriously. “Two people died though.”

“But not at the scene. See, if somebody dies at the scene, or even if they’re DOA at the hospital, they always call for a fatal traffic investigator. He examines the car to see if there’s any problems, anything suspicious. Your friends didn’t die till, when?”

“A couple days later.”

“Right. So nobody looked at the car. The policy’s not retroactive. If somebody dies later, nobody goes back to the car. Unless there’s a specific reason to check it, case closed.”

Ollie picked up the phone and pressed a few buttons. “I’m calling Records.” He drummed his fingers impatiently on the desk. “Jean? Ollie here. I need to see an accident report. Happened over on the Northwood highway. Date was, week ago Sunday?” Jake nodded. “Vehicle owned by a Doctor …” Ollie looked at Jake. “Lowell. Gregory Lowell. Yeah, as soon as you can get it. I’ll be right down. Make two copies, would you? You’re a doll.”

Jake cringed at the word
doll.
Ollie’s cozy little nicknames for female coworkers, ranging from sweetheart to babe, would have him up on sexual harassment charges at the
Trib
.

Ollie marched out the front of his office and headed to the elevator, Jake close on his heels. They arrived down at records within a minute, to see the receptionist putting two pieces of paper into a clean manila file folder.

“Perfect timing,” she said to Ollie.

“You’re the best, Jean. She’s a sweetheart, eh Jake?”

“Um, yes, right, sure is.”

“That’s my job, boys. Just give me the credit when you crack the case, Ollie.”

“Count on it, hon.”

As quickly as that they were back waiting for the elevator, Ollie looking over the report, Jake wondering why Ollie bothered with the elevator for one lousy floor when the stairs would be faster.

“Yep, they handled it like we thought—routine. No reason to suspect anything. Okay, here it is.” Ollie pointed to the bottom of the report as he walked in the elevator. “It’s actually legible. I’ve got to put in this officer for a commendation. Car was taken by Brownlee Towing.”

They were back in the lieutenant’s office and Ollie was pulling a phone book out of the lower left drawer of the desk. Within fifteen seconds he circled a number and dialed.