"Not us," Strauss said. "She knows nothing about The Circle. And besides-"

"But she thinks she does. She thinks she knows our intent. She knows nothing of our purposes and yet feels free to mouth off in public and accuse us of being child molesters. Are we going to stand for this?"

"I don't see that we have much choice," Strauss said.

"There are always choices."

"Really? And what are they here?"

Strauss's unruffled attitude irked Eli. "Find this loudmouthed woman and teach her a lesson."

"I think you're overreacting, Eli," Strauss said.

"Easy for you to say!" Eli hissed. He wanted to shout but was wary of raising his voice. "You're not the one with the stab wound or the concussion!"

"Finding this woman won't make you feel any better."

"Oh, it will! I guarantee you, it will!"

Eli was well aware that he was overreacting, but he'd been hurt and he was in pain, and Strauss had given him no target for retribution, offered scant hope of providing one in the foreseeable future. Finding and ruining this woman would provide a much-needed outlet for his pent-up fury.

"How am I supposed to find her? She hasn't committed a crime."

"Contact Gregson."

"Gregson's with NBC. This was on-"

"Gregson will know what to do." Eli felt his anger bubbling over. Did he have to lead Strauss by the hand? Did he have to do everything! "If you can't find our attacker's name, then get me this woman's name! Do something, damn it!"

13

Charlie closed his Bible. Tried to read 'bout the tau cross in Ezechiel 9:4 but it wasn't happening. The words broke up into jumbles soon as they hit his brain.

Maybe it was the music. The jiggly beat of Point of Grace's "Begin With Me" was pumping through his headphones. Righteous lyrics, but the high-gloss arrangement and funky vocals were distracting tonight. He popped them out of his portable CD player and slipped in "Spirit Of The Century" by the Blind Boys Of Alabama. As their traditional harmonies soothed his head, he lay back on his bed, closed his eyes, and prayed for peace.

But no peace tonight. He kept on seeing his brother splashing like a drowning cat in that pool of blood, kept hearing Jack's voice telling 'bout the Otherness...

Where was Jesus in all this? Why this happening?

Charlie figured it for a test. But of what?

My faith?

He knew his faith was strong. Powerful. So powerful he wondered how he'd got through his pre-conversion years without it. It was like oxygen now. If someone stole it from him, he knew sure he'd die in minutes.

But what says I'm the target of this test? Maybe it Lyle... a test of his faith in nothing.

For as surely as Charlie believed in the healing love of Jesus, so Lyle believed in nothing beyond his five senses. Maybe God was offering Lyle a chance to see how there was more to life than his senses, that life extended beyond the body, that each human body was home to an eternal soul that was gonna be judged when its life on earth was done. Maybe this gonna be Lyle's chance to change, to accept Jesus as his personal savior and see his name written in the Book of Life.

But... if this was the work of God, why was He hiding His hand?

Because that the way He wishes it.

Don't go second guessin' the Lord, Charlie reminded himself.

But where did Jack and Gia fit in? Pretty plain that neither of them were saved. Gia had faith in Jack, but in what else?

And Jack? He a mystery. What he'd said the other night about value for value still hung with Charlie. True that. The way things should be, but weren't... especially not in how he and Lyle had been earning their daily bread.

Jack's outlook didn't seem to be as earthbound as Lyle's, but his talk of the Otherness and the Ally power, of two cosmic forces in eternal conflict... that had Charlie a little shook. Where was God in all that? It didn't even give the God of the Holy Bible the props of being denied. Instead He got bypassed, left and forgotten like an old store by a freeway with no ramp.

And when Charlie had tried to point out that this "Otherness" was just another disguise for Satan, Jack had flipped it 'round, hinting that maybe the idea of Satan had come from awareness of the Otherness.

Charlie rubbed his eyes. He still hadn't answered his question: Who was being tested?

He reopened his Bible. All the answers were here. Have faith and Jesus would guide him to them.

But as for leaving Lyle and breaking up the team, that'd have to wait. Yeah, he promised Reverend Sparks, but if God was gonna go testin' Charlie's faith, he couldn't very well turn his back and geese outta here. And if God testing Lyle, then Charlie wanted to take his brother's back, help him to salvation any way he could. That what brothers was for.

14

Lyle stuck his head into Charlie's room and found him in his usual position, lying on the bed, reading the Bible with gospel playing through his headphones. He waved to catch his attention.

"I'm heading for bed," he said when Charlie took off the headphones.

"Kinda early, yo?"

"Yeah, but there's nothing but that old stuff on the tube. Can't bring myself to watch any more of that."

Charlie held up his Bible. "Gotta extra one if you interested. Great comfort to me, and bro, you look like a dawg who could use some comfort."

Lyle waved him off-not ungently. "Thanks, but I think I'll pass."

"Okay, but you gotta standing offer." Charlie sat up on the edge of his bed. "Strange 'bout the TV. If we think this girl die in the sixties, why's it stuck in the eighties?"

Lyle had been pondering that one too.

"I don't know," he said. "And at the moment I'm too tired to care." He yawned. "You'll be ready to go back to work tomorrow?"

Charlie stared at him. "You gonna be ready to give value for value?"

"What's this? You've switched from quoting scripture to quoting Jack?"

As Lyle started to turn away, Charlie gripped his arm and looked up at him, his eyes searching his face.

"Has what gone down the past few days made you change your mind 'bout a power greater than you?"

Lyle glanced away. An old argument, this one, but now the parameters had changed.

"I'll admit I've encountered a number of phenomena for which I have no rational explanation." He saw Charlie's eyes light and so he hurried on before he could speak. "But that doesn't mean that no rational explanation exists. It simply means that I haven't the information to explain them."

Charlie's face fell. "Ain't you ever givin' in?"

"Surrender to irrationality? Never." He smiled, hoping to soften the impact of his words. "But it has made me afraid of the dark. So I hope you don't mind if I leave a bunch of lights on."

"Go ahead," Charlie said, readjusting his headphones. He held up his Bible. "But this is the only light I need."

Lyle waved and turned away thinking how comforting it must be to believe that the answers to all questions could be found in a single book.

Envying the peace that must bring, he waded down the hall through a sea of turmoil. He'd hidden the uneasiness gnawing at the base of his throat. His home had turned unpredictable, a minefield of dread possibilities. The events of the day had left him jumpy and unsettled, but exhausted as well. Yet the idea of lying down and closing his eyes bordered on the unthinkable.

At least in this house. One night in a motel would do it-allow him a solid eight hours of sleep so he could return in the morning refreshed and ready for anything.

But he was not leaving his home.

Lyle glanced at his alarm clock as he entered his bedroom. It read 3:22. Still running backward. The real time was somewhere around 10:30. Lyle realized he was more than exhausted. He didn't feel well. He hoped the blood in that pool hadn't been contaminated... blood carried all sorts of diseases these days. But then, it hadn't been real blood, had it. Some sort of psychic or ectoplasmic blood...