Bless the Child (70 page)

T
here was an air of unreality for Maggie in the days that followed. The world of ordinary, everyday events seemed almost alien in the wake of the bizarre experiences of the past three months.

Devlin had suffered burns and internal injuries usually associated with electrocution, the doctors said, and they’d kept him in intensive care for forty-eight hours, before he began a steady recovery. Gino assured her the Lieutenant was far too much of a pain in the ass for Heaven to want to deal with him. He also told her that the Screamers had been freed and hospitalized, that Ghania was dead, and that the bodies found at the Vannier estate had been attributed, in the media, to the work of a political terrorist organization out of Libya. She already knew from Ellie the truth of Ghania’s death.

They managed to keep Dev in the hospital for nearly two weeks, and Maggie spent a great deal of time at his bedside trying to come to terms with what she felt for him, and with the aftermath of all they’d endured. He was an impossible patient, once he was well enough to break the rules, and she felt a profound sense of relief when he finally grew cranky enough to complain about being cooped up; his complaints seemed so human, and so alive.

She went to Mass at St. Joseph’s every morning, for Peter, as well as for Dev. Peter had said extraordinary things to her, after their ordeal was over; words that still played and replayed in her mind.

“It was stripped away, Maggie!” he’d told her, the metamorphosis still animating his eyes, as they’d stood in the hospital lobby awaiting news of Devlin. “All of it. The pride, the intellectual gifts, the hubris, the paradox . . . all stripped away so I could see my soul laid bare.

“When the demon rejected my offer of sacrifice, I was utterly undone . . . For the first time in my entire life, I was
nothing.
It humbled me into the Truth—that God didn’t love me
because
of my great gifts, but
despite
them! That all my life I’d sought Him through intellect, when He can only be reached through love! I finally understood where I’d been trying to go, when I turned the corner and lost my way. In that blinding darkness, Maggie, I found my way home.”

And she’d nodded, too overwhelmed by all that had happened, to reply.

“There’s a term used when the theology of the Reign of God is taught, Maggie,” he went on, the emotion of what he’d undergone in his voice. “
Prolepsis.
It’s a forehappening . . . a precursor to the final future. I believe Cody is a
prolepsis
of the future of mankind . . . We’ve been promised by God that the time will come when men and women will live beyond the anomalies, and the conflicts, and the savaging—when we will live fully in the grace of God. I think she’s been sent to remind us of that.
Bless her!
I say, Maggie. Bless the child and all she means for humanity.”

He had a great deal of work to do, he’d said, and the renewed vigor with which to do it.

It occurred to her, on the walk home from the church on the fifteenth of May, that it was only a little more than two weeks since all their lives had nearly come to an end; and in some ways, it felt an eternity. She had a sudden, overwhelming impulse to gather all those who had given so much—to say thank you from the heart, and to celebrate life.

Maria Aparecida
was playing jacks with Cody on the kitchen floor, as she waited, with the precise timing of a surgeon, for the roast to turn the proper shad of pink. Maria, too, had changed with all that had happened; Maggie had not heard a single grumble about anything large or small, since Cody came home.

“God sorts the sheep from the goats, dona Maggie.” she had pronounced when Maggie had placed the child in her waiting arms. “The Good Shepherd always leaves the flock to find the lost lamb.”

Now the sounds of their mingled laughter heartened Maggie, as she sat on the big chintz couch in her living room, a cushion away from Devlin.

He looked thinner, she thought, as she watched him, and he moved carefully, but his mood was good, if pensive.

“There’s a lot I’ve been needing to say to you, Maggie,” he began, reaching for her hand across the cushion. “And I’d like to say it before everyone arrives, tonight.” He stopped, obviously juggling thoughts and emotions.

“I love you, Maggie O’Connor. More than I ever thought I could love anybody . . . and I’d like the chance to find out if we can have a future together. I figure I can’t ask you to live the life of a cop’s wife—it think the fear that goes along with that would curdle your soul—but I’ve thinking there must be something I could do with that law degree, besides decorate my apartment. I can’t see myself on Wall Street or anything like that, but maybe I could find a way to use what I know to do some good in the world. If there’s one thing all this has taught me, it’s that whatever each of us can do for the good, we better do it, now.” He took a deep breath, and caught her eyes with his own.

“Give me a chance not to lose you and Cody, Maggie. I love you more than you know.”

Maggie touched her fingers to his lips, as if she could hold back these words that demanded decisions.

“I love you, too, Dev,” she said slowly, carefully. “But I’m too battered right now, to know much more than that. I think I need some time to understand all that’s happened to me. Where I’ve been . . .
where I’m going.
In the space of the last three months, the world as I knew it has come to an end. Nothing is exactly as I thought . . .” She bit her underlip, a young girl’s gesture. How could she possibly express all the ways in which life had forced her to expand exponentially. She wasn’t even sure she knew yet who she had become.

“Love’s been a little bit hard on me, lately, Dev. If you’ll just give me some time to put my heart back together before I ask anything of it, I promise not to take the love you’ve offered me lightly.”

Devlin brushed a strand of dark hair back from her cheek. “You’ll see, Maggie,” he said, relieved that she hadn’t said no. “One of these days the light will hit me in a certain way and you won’t be able to resist . . .” They laughed together, and it felt right.

“Dev,” she said musingly, “what do you think really happened to us that incredible night? How much of what we think we saw was real? I keep going over and over it all in my head—one minute I’m certain, and the next, my rational mind rebels.”

He shrugged. “I don’t know, Maggie. The Coast Guard said there were no heavy seas in the Sound except for the exact few minutes it took to swamp Ellie’s boat. You
saw
those entities emerge from Cody and Ghania. You
saw
the Amulet and the Stone materialize. I saw Daniel in that infernal portal . . . hell, I even died with him . . . and yet I’m sitting here tonight. Who could possibly explain all that?”

Maggie nodded. “Ellie swears that Jenna helped her put an end to that beast, Ghania, and I
want
to believe that, because in a way it redeems her . . .” She let the thought drift off, confused and uncertain. “But what does all this mean for Cody and me, if it’s real . . . what does it mean for the rest of our lives, and the rest of humanity, for that matter?”

“‘Do not seek to know more than is appropriate . . .’” Devlin replied quietly; in his world, knowledge always seemed to bring pain. “Saint Augustine said that of man’s struggle to understand the notion of Good and Evil, Maggie. He was a smart guy.”

“But do
you
think we had supernatural help in saving Cody, Dev?” she persisted. “Just your opinion, not Saint Augustine’s. I think it’s important that I know for sure, what you believe about all this. Did Sekhmet and those Satanists really try to steal Cody’s ka? Or was that some crazy mass hallucination, provoked by that ghastly place and the emotional horror of all we went through? Was a battle really fought in some other dimension for Cody’s soul, or was that just a figment of Peter’s, and the Rebbe’s, and my own overpowering belief in God? Is it really
possible
that we are all joined by a bond of love that endured for millennia . . . or did we all just need to believe that, so we could live with what’s happened to us?

“I feel as if I need to know
so many
things . . .” She shook her head, still lost in the enormity of all they experienced.

Devlin grinned suddenly. “I’d like to be able to tell you it was all superior police work that saved the day,” he said, “but that’d be a bigger stretch for your imagination than all the rest put together.”

Maggie laughed out loud; it was apparent he no longer thoroughly
dis-
believed, and that was important to her. Maybe they could figure it all out together.

“I guess the biggest question left is what happens next?” she said, pushing the imponderables back a little. “Do you think any members of Maa Kheru will be prosecuted? For Jenna’s murder, or the kidnapping? Or, for anything at all?”

Devlin shook his head, too knowledgeable for optimism. “It looks to me like the fix is already in, Maggie. Too many prominent names . . . too much money changing hands . . . too many people calling William Kunstler and F. Lee Bailey on the hot line, I imagine. Besides, Eric, Nicky, and Ghania are dead, so who’s to get blamed for the Screamers, and Jenna, and everything else that went down in that hell house? I think we just have to content ourselves with the fact that God seems to have provided His own justice, rather than waiting for ours.” He paused for inventory.

“At least the bastards didn’t get the Amulet or the Stone. Imagine what those sons of bitches could have done to the world with tools like that in their hands? Anyway, after what happened to Eric, it seems Satan’s pissed off at them, for getting trounced . . . And you have to admit it was a nice touch that the demon himself did in that son of a bitch.”

Maggie nodded. “You know, Ellie told me a funny thing . . . she could have tipped us off earlier about Hazred being on the wrong team, if I’d ever mentioned his name. It seems
Abdul Hazred
is the name of one of the gatekeepers of Hell—but I just kept calling him ‘the Egyptian . . .’”

Devlin laughed. “It does look as if we were being manipulated by unseen hands, doesn’t it?” he said, leaning back with a sigh. “My mother would have gotten some kick out of seeing me tangled up in the world of spooks and spirits.” He smiled at her memory, then looked at Maggie and said, “I just keep thinking I’m glad it’s over and you’re safe.”

“And, I keep wanting there to be a more tangible justice, Dev,” Maggie replied, ruefully. “There were a lot of powerful, influential people at that Sabbat, who are still out there doing their dirty work. If nobody gets punished, and the world never knows what really happened to us, maybe Camus was right, and ‘The reign of the Beast has begun.’”

“Maybe. Or maybe we’ve just been reminded that here on earth, God’s work must surely be our own.”

Maggie smiled. “I think we did get a chance to help Him out, at least a little, and his friend Isis, too, come to think of it, didn’t we, Dev? And whatever it was that happened to us, Cody’s safe now. The child psychologist I took her to say’s she’s astonishingly healthy, considering all they did to her. And now, she’s free to be just a regular little girl again. She doesn’t have to fend off demons, or save the world, or do anything except love us and be loved. And she never has to hear the word ‘Amulet’ again! From here on in, she can just have a plain old ordinary childhood, like every other three-year-old in America.”

The doorbell rang and Maggie ran to greet Ellie and Amanda, who had arrived simultaneously. Peter and Gino would be along any minute. Everyone laughed and hugged and made a fuss over Cody, until it was her bedtime, when Maggie lifted the child she loved so much into her arms, and carried her happily up the stairs to tuck her in.