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Sam gave the kid a last desperate glance: Trust what you see. “Tell Evie,” he tried to say, but he wasn’t sure if he’d said anything. He needed to warn Evie and the others. They were all in danger. Sam’s legs had stopped working. He felt cold and his eyelids were heavy. The men in the dark suits laid Sam across the backseat of the sedan. Sleep was coming and he couldn’t stop it.
The last thing Sam saw before he lost consciousness was the sweet blue of the sky.
THE FUTURE OF AMERICA
The day came up temperate and dry with a silky morning haze that would easily burn off by noon. Sarah Snow woke with a feeling of loss and foreboding. Her sleep had been haunted by awful dreams of her parents. In her dreams, the ochre dust of Northern China whipped up and coated their mangled bodies like dirty shrouds. They called to her: “Come. Come with us.” In the next moment, she saw Robert lying in the grave. Parasites crawled out of his mouth and eyes. His whispered warning floated on the wind: “Sarah, do not go.”
Sarah had been trained to look for God’s signs. Was this a sign?
The first time God spoke to Sarah Snow, she was thirteen and her parents were dead, though she didn’t know it yet. Her family had been living in China as missionaries, spreading the gospel. It was Sarah who saw what her parents did not: Hungry bellies made for easy converts. None of it was real faith. The smug naiveté of her parents embarrassed Sarah. It hardened her heart to God and miracles. She spoke the words and smiled insipidly when looked at closely, which was rarely. But she did not believe. They could not pry that from her; it was her one rebellion.
It was Robert who changed everything. Robert Thaddeus Carter was fifteen to Sarah’s thirteen, the son of Pentecostal missionaries who received the Holy Spirit in tongues and mystical visions. He had a reputation as a blessed boy, a healer. Spiritual gifts, they called it, and Robert was the most gifted of all.
“I’ve glimpsed heaven, dear Sarah,” he told her once as they pulled water from a well. His voice shook with a joy she had never known. “It’s a beautiful place with shining palaces of pure gold. Oh, Sarah, it’s real, it’s all real.”
The two of them would spend time discussing the Bible, Sarah as a way to get close to Robert, Robert because he believed without doubt. She adored him.
A kala-azar epidemic took Robert. Pale and sweating, he lay on a pallet, his hands and feet grayed with disease. His parents believed him possessed by demons. “We must show the Devil that we are stronger than he is,” Reverend Carter said. For three days, they prayed over Robert as he shook, delirious with fever and prophecy. On the fourth day, they buried him in the hard earth and marked his dusty grave with a simple cross. Sarah felt as if her heart had been buried as well. She read the Bible. She said her prayers. She ministered with her parents. But inside, she was hollow.
On the day her parents died, Sarah had been tidying up the schoolroom when she stiffened as if a warm desert wind passed through her, head to toe. Tears sprang to her eyes, though she couldn’t say why. She felt strangely full and content. It was Robert’s voice she heard, a whisper on the wind: “Sarah, be not afraid, for I am with thee.…” For the space of a breath, she swore she saw him shining in the doorway like a floury thumbprint left on a clean table. She blinked, and the sensation was gone as quickly as it had come over her. “Come back,” she begged quietly. “Oh, please. Come back!” She heard her name called again, this time loud and anguished. Sarah’s earlier contentment was replaced by dread. A convert raced across the plain, waving his hand. There’d been a motoring accident. Her parents’ car had lost control in the mountains and struck a tree. They’d been killed instantly.
A steamer carried the orphaned Sarah Snow back to America, where a well-meaning (if not particularly affectionate) Methodist couple took her in. At seventeen, she married and settled into life in a small town. But her ambition was greater than being a housewife in a backwater town. And when her young husband died rather suddenly, too, Sarah found she was more relieved than grieved.
A touring car took her across the nation. Every time Sarah placed her hands on the shoulders of a broken man or woman asking for God’s grace, she hoped for a repeat of that moment she’d experienced in the schoolroom the day her parents died. The day she thought she saw Robert Carter come back from the dead. A moment when she felt connected to something larger. When it didn’t come, Sarah lost faith a second time. She lost faith in the wonders of the world. In magical boys like Robert T. Carter. Maybe Robert had been sent to tempt her, like Satan tempting Christ in the desert. By making her think she could be so much more. He’d tempted her with the idea that she might be special. Anointed by God. Why else show her such wonders in another human being only to deny her those same wonders?
And then came the Diviners. People like Evie O’Neill and her friends were a cheap imitation of Christ’s glory, a pox on the nation, one that needed curing. And Sarah understood now that the Almighty had been training her all along, patiently waiting for her to ascend to his call. She would answer it with fire, as his soldier.
Yes, God had been waiting for her. That must have been the message of her dream. She would not disappoint him. Why, today was the start of everyt
hing! Hundreds of thousands would come to the exhibition. They would hear her, hear the Word. Besides, Jake Marlowe had chosen her personally. Sarah had been lonely, and Jake had been so kind. Together, the two of them would be unstoppable. She was being silly, letting a dream get to her. Snake oil salesmen. That was what Diviners were. What match were they against the hand of the Almighty?
By the time she pinned the fresh orchid to her Crusaders cape, Sarah had pushed aside her misgivings. Jake had sent a driver for her.
Mrs. Jake Marlowe. Yes, that was a fine name.
Sarah stepped out into the glorious spring day. It smelled of roses. It smelled of success.
From his room high atop the Astor Hotel, Jake Marlowe scowled at his watch. “Where the devil is he?”
“We’ve looked everywhere, Mr. Marlowe,” the man said apologetically.
“He’s six-foot-four and the size of Adonis. You’re telling me he can hide that easily?”
“Sorry, sir.”
“Fine!” Marlowe grumbled, straightening his collar. “We’ll have to head to the fairgrounds without him. But don’t stop looking.”
In her hotel room, Evie paced, stopping only when she realized she was acting just like Will. Where was Sam? He’d promised to be there by ten, and it was now nearly ten thirty.
She was furious with him. And worried. Once upon a time, Sam might’ve run off, chasing after some lead by himself, leaving her in the lurch. But he’d never do that to her now, not this morning, not after what they’d shared last night. That had been very real. She knew it. She felt it deep down.
But what if something had happened to him?
There was a knock at the door, and Evie ran to it, relieved.
“Finally! You’d better have a good excuse, Sam—oh.”
It wasn’t Sam at the door but a kid. His fingernails and shirt were stained with shoe polish. “Miss O’Neill?”
