James Bell - Deadlock

Dr. Weinstein smiled and said to Millie, “Let’s go in here,” motioning toward the double doors leading to a hallway.

It was ominously quiet, like a morgue. “What is it?” Millie asked. “How is my mother? What’s happening?”

“Justice Hollander,” he said, “your mother is awake.”

Millie couldn’t find a response. Her hand went to her mouth.

“You can see her now,” Dr. Weinstein said.

Without thinking, Millie found herself turning to Jack Holden. He squeezed her arm and smiled. Then they turned and followed Dr. Weinstein to Ethel’s room.

Ethel was on a bed, a tired smile on her face. When she saw Millie she put up both arms. One had a tube taped to it. Ethel seemed completely unconcerned.

Millie wanted to fall into her mother’s arms. She contented herself with a kiss to her cheek. “Mom…,” she whispered.

“Scare you?” Ethel said, her voice thready.

Millie drew back her head. “Yes,” she said. “I thought I’d lost you.”

“No, no,” Ethel said.

“I’m sick with worry.”

Ethel smiled a little then. “Let it roll off your back, like a duck,” she said slowly.

“Sure, Mom.”

“We still have time.”

The words hit Millie with an odd resonance. Where had she heard them before? And then it struck her. The homeless man, just before her accident. You still have time. Weird coincidence.

“Yes, Mom, we do,” Millie said.

Ethel motioned to her to lean over close, like she wanted to whisper something. Millie bent over, turning her ear toward her mother’s mouth.

“I’m proud you’re my daughter,” Ethel said.

Millie did not move, warmth from her mother’s cheek filling her, holding her there. To hide her tears, Millie buried her face in the side of Ethel’s pillow.

Millie finally allowed Holden to drive her home to Santa Lucia around midnight. Only the promise that he would bring her back in the morning got her out of the hospital.

“Tell me about near-death experiences,” she said, to break the silence. He had talked about them in his sermon, and she had wondered if she would ever let him know about her vision. Now, she thought, she just might.

Holden kept his eyes on the highway. “What do you want to know?”

“Isn’t it just a psychological response? Something the brain does in a certain state? Like a dream?”

“Some people believe that. Most, probably. Within the Christian community there is some skepticism, too.”

“Why?”

“Theological issues. The Bible says it is appointed for a man once to die, and then to face the judgment. Having this so-called near-death experience could be viewed as contradicting Scripture. I don’t see it that way.”

“But people do report seeing Jesus, don’t they? Or some white light?”

“True. But we have to be careful. There are those who claim to have received special revelation from Jesus, or God, and then want to spread that information around. That I do think is a contradiction of Scripture.”

“So do you or don’t you believe in these reports?”

“Oh, I do believe it happens. Have you heard of D. L. Moody?”

“Vaguely.”

“He was an evangelist in the 1800s. The Billy Graham of his day. A great man of God. He had two little grandchildren who died. One was a boy named Dwight, who died in infancy. The other was a little girl, Irene, who was three years old or so. Their father was Moody’s son, Will.”

Millie listened attentively, as if receiving the facts from a new case to be considered.

“When Moody was on his deathbed, his son, Will, heard him mutter, ‘Earth recedes, heaven opens before me.’ Then he looked at Will and said, ‘It is beautiful. God is calling me and I must go. Don’t call me back.’ ”

The hum of the car was smooth and calm, like they were riding on air. The stars were particularly bright in the desert sky.

“Moody’s wife was summoned,” Holden said. “Moody was able to tell her she had been a good, dear wife. And then he seemed to fall into unconsciousness again, but as he did he whispered, ‘No pain, no valley. It is bliss.’ ”

“Who recorded all this?” Millie could not help delving into issues such as witness accounts.

“Several family members,” Holden said, “most notably his wife. In fact, she set down the facts the same day they happened. Moody came out of sleep and saw the people around him. And then he looked at them and said: ‘What does it all mean? I must have had a trance. I went to the gate of heaven. It was so wonderful. I saw the children!’ ”

“Children?”

“Irene and Dwight. He told Will he saw them in heaven. Will began to cry. Moody comforted him. Will said he wished he could go to heaven to be with his children. And Moody told him, ‘No. Your work is before you.’ A short time later, D. L. Moody died.”

Millie looked at the headlights, illuminating just enough of the highway to see a short way ahead, but no more. “May I ask another question?” she said.

“Of course,” said Holden.

“What do you make of the experiences of the other sort?”

“You mean a vision of hell?”

“Are there many of those?”

“Oh, yes. Experiences of demons and fire and things like that.”

“So what do you think?”

“Same as with the white light. I believe that there is such a place as hell, though I don’t know the exact nature of it. I do believe it is separation from God, and some people who have almost died have been given the gift of seeing how horrible it will be.”

“Gift?”

“Sure. The gift of time. In most cases these people become believers in God. I think God is in control. The Bible makes it abundantly clear that God rules over everything, including death and hell.”

Millie tried to make sense of that, tried to allow for a new reality, but her mind simply did not allow it. It was too big a jump.

“Do you want to tell me about your death experience now?” Jack Holden asked.

Millie’s chest tightened. “Am I that transparent?”

“You don’t have to.”

Millie felt that if she did, she would be opening a door she would rather keep closed. But another part of her prodded her on. If she didn’t say something now, she might never have the courage to do it.

“I’m claiming clergy privilege now,” she said.

“I consider all of our conversations privileged,” Holden said.

She knew she could trust him. “I did have a vision,” she said. “It was like a very vivid nightmare. It was not the good kind of vision, but the bad kind.” She described in detail what she had seen.

When she finished, Holden was silent for a moment. Then he said, “I have no reason to doubt that what you experienced was real, and that when you called out to God to help you, it was a real prayer. A prayer that was answered.”

“But people in distress are bound to call on God. It’s a reaction.”

“God does not turn a deaf ear just because it’s a reaction.”

“There is one other thing,” Millie said, looking out into the desert darkness. “This vision, if that’s what it was, happened at exactly the time you and my mother were praying for me. Exactly the same time.”

Jack Holden’s face, even in the darkness, seemed to open up with intense curiosity. “How do you know?”

“The doctor told me the time at which I flatlined. Then Mom told me what time it was when you were praying. Accounting for the time difference, it was on target.”

“Well now.”

The car hummed along in silence for a while. Exactly what she needed then, silence. Millie had unloaded more of her inner life in the last few minutes than she had in the last ten years.

Then Holden said, “For a long time I’ve felt that God is weaving a pattern for something big.”