Glenn Beck - The Eye of Moloch

“We . . . are . . . Americans.”

He fully expected to be shot in the next moment and he would have taken that bullet with no regrets.

But it didn’t happen.

Instead the man picked up the pistol Noah had dropped and then took a step back. He then made a motion toward the trees and another of them came near.

“There were only four places you could have come out, Mr. Gardner”—the man was helping Noah to his feet as he spoke—“and we covered them all. If we’d gotten here sooner maybe we could’ve—”

“I don’t understand. Who are you?”

“Virginia Ward sent us,” the man said. “We’re here to take you home.”

Chapter 66

That word home meant something different to all six of the survivors, but for each one it was also just another treasured thing from a past to which they could never return. The nearest they could come was a place they’d only heard about from Molly Ross, but never seen. That was their destination.

Over the first fourteen hundred miles they traveled in short, guarded segments from one safe house to the next. In these caring hands, after several days of good food and rest and medical care it wasn’t too long before all were on the road to a full recovery.

Virginia Ward’s men had left them near Cheyenne, then. From that point on, Thom Hollis knew the way.

They rode northwest as far as the main roads would carry them, divided up and hidden among the sleeper compartments of a convoy of long-haul truckers sympathetic to the cause. The final leg of the journey was taken on horseback and later on foot from the last place of friendly sanctuary just south of the Bighorn Mountains.

Though the weather was mild, the terrain was as harsh as it was unspoiled, and without a savvy woodsman for a guide Noah and the others would have never made it through the rugged wilderness. Even experienced hikers, hunters, and adventurers stayed away from this part of the high country. Many who’d wandered into the region in the past had been lost, never to be seen again.

Of course, that’s why the settlement was founded where it was; why Molly and her mother had chosen this patch of remote, forbidding land as their place of last refuge for the Founders’ Keepers. Though the route to get there was hazardous, in a place like this her people might be safe from the worst of the world outside.

Noah hadn’t known what to expect upon his arrival, and at first glance there wasn’t much to see.

From a hill overlooking the valley ahead he was able to count only a handful of simple dwellings and a broken dirt path that wound between them. At this distance the man-made additions to the woods were nearly invisible among the tall aspen and evergreen trees. Hollis came up to his side and pointed out nine more structures, for a total of thirteen.

At the end of this last long day of travel, now with only a final half mile to go, Noah sat to rest and think for a while, and Hollis sat beside him while the others went on ahead.

“I’m sorry,” Noah said, after a time.

“You’re sorry for what?”

“I should have kept her from going back into that place. I should’ve protected her.”

Hollis smiled at that. “One thing I learned about Molly a long time ago. Once she set her mind to something, wild horses couldn’t drag her off it. You couldn’t have stopped her. Hell, I tried and I couldn’t stop her, either. Just put yourself at ease about that, at least. She did what she felt she had to do, like always. The Lord moves in mysterious ways.”

Noah looked over at him. “That God business, that’s new for you, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it is.”

“And what brought this on?”

“Had my eyes opened up, I guess, in the course of those last few days. I finally heard His voice.”

“You heard a voice.”

Hollis nodded.

“And this was when you were running a fever of what, a hundred and five?”

“Nevertheless.”

“But we lost this one, Hollis. Molly’s dead, and so are a lot of other good people. We accomplished nothing at all in Pennsylvania. Everyone who was chasing us before, as far as we know they’re all still after us. I don’t really see any answered prayers here. If this is God’s will, I don’t understand it. That voice you heard might as well have been coming from hell.”

“A month ago I might’ve said the same thing,” Hollis said. “Come tomorrow, you might feel different.”

It was nearly sundown and, after a few more minutes of quiet reflection, they got to their feet again and continued on. At the border of the clearing the path became gradually wider, graded even and cleared of a late-season snow.

First they passed a small log cabin with firelight warming its interior in the dusk, a wispy curl of wood smoke from its chimney dispersing in the light breeze. Next came what appeared to be the beginnings of a general store, and a closer look through its picture windows confirmed it was exactly that. The shelves inside were filled with provisions: canned foods, fuel and lamp oils, medicines, dried meats, burlap bags of seed and grain, soaps and other essentials, batteries, and a cache of ammunition and some hunting and trapping needs.

At the midpoint of the main thoroughfare stood a longer, taller building, solidly and artfully constructed, with wide doors and a heavy brass bell hung beneath its awning. It could have been a meeting hall, a school, a storm shelter, a church, or a fortress, depending on the needs of the day.

Some of the small, simple homes appeared to be occupied; others were dark. As he walked along he saw a checkered curtain pull aside behind a front window. The face of a child came close to the glass. She smiled and gave a little wave, and as he returned the greeting Noah was touched by the honest, innocent nature of the exchange. This little girl had greeted a stranger with no concern at all for his intentions; if he was here, he was a friend. Surrounded as she was by her family and her neighbors, within these protected borders there wasn’t much for her to fear.

Noah stopped walking then, and Hollis soon came up beside him.

He was looking at a small, handsome cottage near the end of the path just ahead. Snow had settled in highlights on the shingles, the railings, and the windowsills, like the frosting that puts the final touches on a gingerbread house. There were in-ground doors to a root cellar by the stairs to the porch, a lean-to in back for tools to tend the grounds, and facing east, a sunroom with a wooden bench swing. A low split-rail fence enclosed a small plot to the side where a flower garden might be planted in the spring.

As Noah looked closer he saw that there was a large dog lying by the steps to the front door. The animal sat up abruptly as it noticed the two men, and then after a moment it reclined again. It seemed as though it had been there for a long while, patiently waiting for someone to return.

“Here we are,” Hollis said. “This is your place now. That’s what she would have wanted.”

Noah had seen this fine little home and its grounds before, of course, in a pencil sketch pinned up on Molly’s bedroom wall in that loft long ago in New York City. An artist’s rendering will sometimes endow a beloved thing with such an abundance of romance that its subject, once seen in person, can’t help but disappoint. But this place was every bit as beautiful as the dream of it she’d once drawn, sight unseen.

• • •

He awoke alone in her bed to the sounds of conversation and the smells of fresh coffee and frying bacon in the next room.

When he paused at the doorway he had to blink a time or two to be certain of what he saw. Hollis was by the fireplace tending the meal, and at the table nearby sat Virginia Ward.