Jensen said, ‘Is it because you’ve lost your powers? If that’s the case, why did you come?’
‘It’s God’s power, sir, not mine, and I haven’t lost it. But an expulsion takes great energy and great strength. Five years ago I suffered a major heart attack shortly after performing one on a young girl who had been in a terrible car accident. We were successful, she and I, but the cardiologist I consulted in Jonesboro told me that if I ever exerted myself in such a way again, I might suffer another attack. This one fatal.’
Newsome raised a gnarled hand – not without effort – to the side of his mouth and spoke to Kat and Melissa in a comic stage whisper. ‘I think he wants twenty million.’
‘What I want, sir, is seven hundred and fifty thousand.’
Newsome just stared at him. It was Melissa who asked, ‘Why?’
‘I am pastor of a church in Titusville. The Church of Holy Faith, it’s called. Only there’s no church anymore. We had a dry summer in my part of the world. There was a wildfire, started by drunken campers. My church is now just a concrete footprint and a few charred beams. I and my parishioners have been worshipping in an abandoned gas station–convenience store on the Jonesboro Pike. It is not satisfactory during the winter months, and there are no homes large enough to accommodate us. We are many but poor.’
Kat listened with interest. As con-man stories went, this was an excellent one. It had all the right sympathy hooks.
Jensen, who still had the body of a college athlete to go with the mind of a Harvard MBA, asked the obvious question. ‘Insurance?’
Rideout once more shook his head in that deliberate way: left, right, left, right, back to center. He still stood towering over Newsome’s state-of-the-art bed like some country-ass guardian angel. ‘We trust in God.’
‘You might have been better off with Allstate,’ Melissa said.
Newsome was smiling. Kat could tell from the stiff way he held his body that he was in serious discomfort – his pills were now half an hour overdue – but he was ignoring the pain because he was interested. That he could ignore it was something she’d known for quite awhile now. He could master the pain if he chose to. He had resources. She had thought she was merely irritated with this, but now, probably prompted by the appearance of the charlatan from Arkansas, she discovered she was actually infuriated. It was so wasteful.
‘I have consulted with a local builder – not a member of my flock, but a man of good repute who has done repairs for me in the past and quotes a fair price. He tells me that it will cost approximately seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars to rebuild.’
Uh-huh, Kat thought.
‘We don’t have such monetary resources, of course. But then, not even a week after speaking with Mr Kiernan, your letter came, along with the video disk. Which I watched with great interest, by the way.’
I’ll bet you did, Kat thought. Especially the part where the doctor from San Francisco says the pain associated with his injuries can be greatly alleviated by physical therapy. Stringent physical therapy.
It was true that nearly a dozen other doctors on the DVD had claimed themselves at a loss, but Kat believed Dr Dilawar was the only one with the guts to talk straight. She had been surprised that Newsome had allowed the disk to go out with that interview on it, but since his accident, the sixth-richest man in the world had slipped a few cogs.
‘Will you pay me enough to rebuild my church, sir?’
Newsome studied him. Now there were small beads of sweat just below his receding hairline. Kat would give him his pills soon, whether he asked for them or not. The pain was real enough, it wasn’t as though he were faking or anything, it was just …
‘Would you agree not to ask for more? I’m talking gentleman’s agreement, we don’t need to sign anything.’
‘Yes.’ Rideout said it with no hesitation.
‘Although if you’re able to remove the pain – expel the pain – I might well make a contribution of some size. Some considerable size. What I believe you people call a love offering.’
‘That would be your business, sir. Shall we begin?’
‘No time like the present. Do you want everyone to leave?’
Rideout shook his head again: left to right, right to left, back to center. ‘I will need assistance.’
Magicians always do, Kat thought. It’s part of the show.
Outside, the wind shrieked, rested, then roused itself again. The lights flickered. Behind the house, the generator (also state-of-the-art) burped to life, then stilled.
Rideout sat on the edge of the bed. ‘Mr Jensen there, I think. He looks strong and quick.’
‘He’s both,’ Newsome said. ‘Played football in college. Running back. Hasn’t lost a step since.’
‘Well … a few,’ Jensen said modestly.
Rideout leaned toward Newsome. His dark, deeply socketed eyes studied the billionaire’s scarred face solemnly. ‘Answer a question for me, sir. What color is your pain?’
‘Green,’ Newsome replied. He was looking back at the preacher with fascination. ‘My pain is green.’
Rideout nodded: up, down, up, down, back to center. Eye contact never lost. Kat was sure he would have nodded with exactly the same look of grave confirmation if Newsome had said his pain was blue, or as purple as the fabled People-Eater. She thought, with a combination of dismay and real amusement: I could lose my temper here. I really could. It would be the most expensive tantrum of my life, but still – I could.
‘And where is it?’
‘Everywhere.’ It was almost a moan. Melissa took a step forward, giving Jensen a look of concern. Kat saw him shake his head a little and motion her back to the doorway.
‘Yes, it likes to give that impression,’ Rideout said, ‘but it’s a liar. Close your eyes, sir, and concentrate. Look for the pain. Look past the false shouts it gives – ignore the cheap ventriloquism – and locate it. You can do this. You must do it, if we’re to have any success.’
Newsome closed his eyes. For a space of ninety seconds there was no sound but the wind and the rain spattering against the windows like handfuls of fine gravel. Kat’s watch was the old-fashioned wind-up kind, a nursing school graduation present from her father many years ago, and when the wind lulled, the room was quiet enough for her to hear its self-important ticking. And something else: at the far end of the big house: elderly Tonya Marsden singing softly as she neatened up the kitchen at the end of another day. Froggy went a-courtin and he did ride, uh-huh.
At last Newsome said, ‘It’s in my chest. High in my chest. Or at the bottom of my throat, below the windpipe.’
‘Can you see it? Concentrate!’
Vertical lines appeared on Newsome’s forehead. Scars from the skin that had been flayed open during the accident wavered through these grooves of concentration. ‘I see it. It’s pulsing in time to my heartbeat.’ His lips pulled down in an expression of distaste. ‘It’s nasty.’
Rideout leaned closer. ‘Is it a ball? It is, isn’t it? A green ball.’
‘Yes. Yes! A little green ball that breathes!’
Like the rigged-up tennis ball you undoubtedly have either up your sleeve or in that big black lunchbox of yours, Rev, she thought.
And, as if she were controlling him with her mind (instead of just deducing where this foolish little playlet would go next), Rideout said, ‘Mr Jensen, sir. There’s a lunchbox under the chair I was sitting in. Get it and open it and stand next to me. You need to do no more than that for the moment. Just—’
Kat MacDonald snapped. It was a snap she actually heard in her head. It sounded like Roger Miller snapping his fingers during the intro to ‘King of the Road.’