CHURCH LADY P.I.: Part # 15 (Waking)

CHURCH LADY P.I. Part # 15

(WAKING)

REMEMBER: This is a mystery and it must be read in order, including the  Introduction, then Part 1, Part 2, etc. Also read the Companion Blog Post from my Personal Blog, "Laura-Lee Was Here" called, "FINALLY FINISHED: Church Lady P.I." There are clues everywhere. (LR)

Even before I opened my eyes I was conscious of a presence. When I did eventually open them I was looking into a face of deep compassion from which two of the bluest eyes were shining. I wondered how long he had been there watching over me, even while I was unaware of it. His name came to my muddled brain and since to speak his name was to make him smile, I did just that.

"Bert."

And then he was gone.

I remember when I was a small child I had a big old 'Tom' cat. He followed me everywhere. He always had to be near me, but he never displayed any emotions for me one way or another. One day I fell off my tricycle, hit my head and lost consciousness. When I woke up I discovered my cat was nudging me over and over with his nose, licking my face all over and mewing at the top of his lungs. He had been too small to move me or help me in any way, but he had never left my side as I lay there and when he saw me start to move he was so over joyed that he just couldn't contain his emotions.

In Marc's case ... same reaction; just different species.

But as pleasant as it was to have Marc making such a fuss over me, I was in a lot of pain and when I let out a gasp, he started yelling for a nurse. I'd never seen him so undone before, nor so expressive in public. When a nurse didn't immediately respond he ran out of the room to grab one.

My breathing was shallow and I longed to take a deep breath, but when I tried to do just that, pain like I'd never known before snatched away the little breath I had and I actually saw stars swim before my eyes. By the time Marc returned with two nurses and a doctor, from wherever he had abducted them from, my mind was clearing "thanks" to all that pain and the first thing I said was, "Sarah?!" and  instinctively started to rise from my bed.

It was a nurse who put a restraining arm on me as the doctor started doing things to me with his hands and a little light. Marc's face came back into focus and he said gently and reassuringly, "She's fine. Sarah's fine. Don't worry."

The doctor asked me about my scale of pain and ordered the nurses to "up" my dosage of this and that. When they scampered out of the room to do the doctor's bidding, with Bert on their heels, and the doctor finally took his leave as well, Marc was sitting in a chair right next to my bed and holding my hand. That's when I noticed how awful he looked and knew that the vigil he had held next to me had been both intense and lengthy. But he waited for me to speak first.

"Did the cabin blow up?" I asked with a raspy voice.

"Yes."

"Mr. Harker?"

Marc just shook his head.

"But Sarah's okay?" I rushed to ask.

"Yes. She wasn't in the cabin anymore and was actually quite a distance away when it exploded. Yet she still did receive some injuries."

My eyes widened. He continued quickly, "The explosion splintered the old wood logs the cabin was made of and some pieces of it have been found as far away as three miles from the campground. But you're the only one who received life threatening injuries."

"Did you get hurt anywhere?" I asked anxiously.

"Me? No. I'm indestructible." He teased.

"Actually," Marc continued, "because I was luring the sentries as far away from the cabin as possible, it saved all three of our lives. Coach Fabre is now one of us. Or should I say, 'one with us'."

I knew what he meant. This Coach Fabre had given his life over to Jesus ... completely. Now he was no longer an 'enemy' to us or to Jesus. And it brought back to my mind some of the final conversation I had had with Mr. Harker, but only in a partial and jumbled way.

I had quoted partly from the book of Romans, chapter 5. "But God demonstrated his love for us that while we were sinners and God's enemies, Christ died for us."  I knew it wasn't exactly that, but something like it.
            { Romans 5:8-11 }

By having his life spared, the coach had been confronted by the ultimate evidence of Jesus' love for us, that he died not just for his "friends" but his "enemies" as well, so that one day we might all be members of His "family".

LINK to Next Part # 16 "Epilogue: Case Facts"




"FINALLY FINISHED: Church Lady P.I." from Laura-Lee Was Here Blog (Companion Post)

CHURCH LADY P.I.: Introduction




Copyright 2015 "The characters and events in this story are not meant to represent any persons living or dead and are entirely a product of the imagination of the writer." LR

CHURCH LADY P.I.: Part # 16 (Epilogue Case Facts)

CHURCH LADY P.I. Part # 16

(EPILOGUE: CASE FACTS)

REMEMBER: This is a mystery and it must be read in order, including the  Introduction, then Part 1, Part 2, etc. Also read the Companion Blog Post from my Personal Blog, "Laura-Lee Was Here" called, "FINALLY FINISHED: Church Lady P.I." There are clues everywhere. (LR)



I was very weak that first moment I awoke so I didn't learn all the facts of what happened that night at the Mount Zion Christian Camp or about the facts of the entire case until later. Soon after that first conversation with Marc a nurse came back in, gave me a shot and I was promptly falling back asleep and very grateful to do it. But not before I got Marc to promise he'd go and get some rest for himself as well.

Apparently, I had been very badly wounded although everyone kept saying with amazement that considering my proximity to the blast I should be dead.  My main and most grievous injury had been a large piece of wood that had ripped through my left shoulder and had punctured my left lung as well. It had missed my heart by a "fraction of a fraction of an inch" or else I would have been "fish food", as Bert told me. Repeatedly. They had reconstructed my left shoulder as best they could, but that arm would never work properly again.

Sarah wasn't mortally wounded in any way, but she would have to live the remainder of her life with a prosthetic right hand. I longed to see Sarah and reassure myself that she was okay, but when a week had passed and still nobody had brought her to see me I deduced that something was being kept from me. So as my meal tray was cleared away and Bert (who had taken it upon himself to keep watch over me, especially whenever Marc wasn't present) followed the 'tray lady' out of the room, I turned to where Marc was seated.

The two of us were just looking at each other. We had grown so close that it seemed that even in silent moments we could communicate. Perhaps that's when we communicated best.
His smile darkened and he looked at his hands.

"Now." I began,
 "Tell me what it is you've all been sparing me from."

He looked up at me and gave a firm nod and without any preamble he said, "Ginnette didn't make it. She died."

As an investigator, "the facts" of something had always been a priority, with  emotions always having to wait. But at that moment, even though I didn't know what had happened to her, "the facts" seemed secondary. And, for the second time, I just started to cry bitterly and let the sobs shake me. Marc rose from his chair, came over, wrapped his arms around me and there we remained. Sharing our first truly deep sorrow together.

I suppose in physical weakness my mind had pushed most of the events of that night at "Mount Zion" camp out of my mind, but now my final conversation with Mr. Harker and all that surrounded it came rushing back to me.

Somehow I had come to the conclusion that Harker had been actually wearing the bomb that caused the explosion. Just like a suicide bomber. But in truth, the four of us had bumbled into a camp filled with evil. The bomb was rigged to the bed that Sarah was laying on. It was armed and needed a constant pressure of the weight about the equivalent of a small child to keep it from going off. If Sarah left the bed, or moved around too much it would go off.

When Mr. Harker left the room and was busy with me at the front door, Ginnette crawled into the back bedroom of the cabin through the window. Sarah was not asleep, as Marc had supposed, and quickly told her mother what was happening. Ginnette got into bed with Sarah to add her weight to the bed and sent Sarah out the window, telling her that she would soon follow after she found something that "weighed enough" to put onto the bed.

As for my conversation with Harker, the Bible says Christians are "Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us."
           { 2 Corinthians 5:20 }

Even though at the time it was going on I didn't understand exactly what  was happening, I fully believe that Mr. Harker did. He knew it wasn't me standing there and saying those things to him, but Jesus speaking through me. Pleading for Harker's life, even after Harker had given up on himself.

What did Jesus say to Mr. Harker that night?

 "That he longed to gather him ..."

"That he could give him abundant life ..."

"That he was not just the 'way out' but the Way completely ..."

And ultimately, Romans chapter 5 and verse 8,
"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

And for those of you who have trouble accepting this explanation, remember this, I called Mr. Harker "Joseph", even though I didn't know what his first name was. In fact, I couldn't find anyone who knew what his first name was until several weeks later. But, in spite of Christ's pleas, Joseph Harker still shut the door ... and locked it shut ... from the inside. Could I have witnessed any greater tragedy than that?

Yet, there is still the hope that our God who "so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life"  {  John 3:16 }  was able to convince Mr. Harker to yield his life in the fraction of a second it took for the explosion to rip from the back bedroom to the front room. When Jesus is involved, a person can go from death to life that quickly.

If you seriously consider it, how long does it actually take for a human heart to surrender and be reunited to it's Creator?

LINK to Next Part # 17 "Epilogue: Facts & Life"




FINALLY FINISHED: Church Lady P.I. from Laura-Lee Was Here Blog (Companion Post)

CHURCH LADY P.I.: Introduction






Copyright 2015 "The characters and events in this story are not meant to represent any persons living or dead and are entirely a product of the imagination of the writer." LR