Keeping Faith Read online

  He tries to ignore the sound of the door opening, but the creaking is phenomenally loud, and as a man of the cloth, he feels duty-bound to offer support to a grieving soul, if need be. He gets to his feet, wipes off the knees of his jeans, and turns around.

  To his surprise, Rabbi Solomon is staring at the cross as if it were a rattlesnake poised to strike. "Interfaith, my foot."

  "Rabbi," Father MacReady says.

  They size each other up, never having met but aware through the grapevine that they are both here in support of Faith White.

  Rabbi Solomon nods.

  "Have you heard anything?"

  "I went up to Pediatrics. They wouldn't let me into the room. Something's going on."

  "Something good?"

  The rabbi shakes his head. "I don't think so."

  The two men stand in silence. "Don't Jews need a minimum number of people to pray?" MacReady asks after a moment.

  Solomon grins. "It's not a minimum, really. It's a min-yan, ten men. It's the smallest group you can have if you want to say some particular prayers."

  "Strength in numbers, eh?"

  "Exactly," the rabbi says. And without saying another word, the rabbi and priest sit down side by side in the pew, and silently begin to pray together.

  "This is the situation," a smooth-faced young doctor says to Millie. "Her renal system's gone into failure. If we don't put her on dialysis, she's likely to poison her whole bloodstream."

  Millie stares at this man for a moment, uncomprehending. How can this boy, younger than Mariah even, be telling her what they have to do? For the past half hour Faith's room has been buzzing with nurses and doctors and aides ferrying in equipment that gleams bright and unfamiliar, setting hooks and tubes and masks on her granddaughter until she resembles nothing more than an astronaut preparing to journey to an unknown world.

  Not for the first time, Millie wishes that it were her mind, and not her heart, that had been cleared and resurrected. She stares at Faith, willing her to open her eyes, to smile, to tell them it wasn't as serious as they all thought. Where, she wonders, is your God now?

  Just an hour ago, Mariah had called from the courthouse, and Millie had been able to say that everything was just the way it had been when she left. How could so much have gone wrong so quickly? "I'm not the one you should be asking," Millie hedges. "Her mother..."

  "Is not here. If you don't sign the consent form, this little girl will die."

  Millie swipes her hand over her eyes, then picks up the pen that he extends like a peace pipe, and gives her permission.

  Ian steps into the witness box, and there is a moment of levity when the clerk of the court approaches with the customary Bible. He laughs, then good-naturedly looks up at the ceiling. "Okay, y'all. Get ready for lightning to strike."

  Metz swaggers toward his witness. "Please state your name and address for the record."

  "Ian Fletcher, Brentwood, California."

  "What do you do for a living, Mr. Fletcher?"

  "As I do sincerely hope everyone knows, I'm a professional atheist. I currently coproduce and star in a television show that features my views. In addition, I'm the author of three New York Times nonfiction bestsellers. Come to think of it, I had a cameo in a film once, too."

  "Can you explain to the court what your television show is like, for those who may not be familiar with it?"

  "Well, my show's been described as the anti-Billy Graham. I have a TV pulpit, but I use it to prove God doesn't exist, through theory and scientific inquiry."

  "Do you believe in God, Mr. Fletcher?"

  "Kind of hard to when you're an atheist." There are snickers from the gallery.

  "For the past two months, what alleged religious miracles have you been examining?"

  Ian crosses one leg over the other. "A bleeding statue over in Massachusetts, a tree in Maine--and most lately, Faith White."

  "Why were you following that particular case?"

  Ian shrugs. "She supposedly was seeing God and performing miracles and exhibiting stigmata. I intended to prove she was a hoax."

  Metz moves in for his kill. "Mr. Fletcher, can you tell us what you found?"

  For a moment Ian looks at the attorney, replaying in his mind the testimony he'd practiced with Metz as recently as yesterday. A long, slow smile transforms his face. "To tell you the truth, Mr. Metz," he says, "not a hell of a lot."

  Metz, ready to throw his next question like a dart, falters in his steps. "Pardon me?"

  Ian leans closer to the microphone. "I said, 'not a hell of a lot.'" He nods at the stenographer. "Is that about right?"

  The gallery begins buzzing and humming, picking up on the disconnection between the plaintiff's attorney and the famous witness. "What you're saying," Metz paraphrases, "is that you haven't seen a lot of these so-called miracles."

  "Objection," Joan calls out. "Leading."

  "Sustained."

  "Actually, Mr. Metz," Ian answers, "what I'm saying is that I've found nothing to support the theory that Faith White is a charlatan."

  Metz starts shaking; he wonders if it is visible to the judge or to Joan Standish. He remembers his first meeting with Fletcher, when Fletcher had expressly said there was something big about Faith White that he was keeping under wraps. He recalls Fletcher's deposition--how the man had pleaded the Fifth for every question. At the time Metz had found it amusing, for all it rattled Joan Standish. But now he sees that Ian pleaded the Fifth because he knew, all along, that he wasn't willing to perjure himself by refusing to give testimony sworn in a deposition. Whatever he promised Metz he'd say in the confines of the law office was a lie--and there is nothing at all Metz can do about it. Fletcher could get up here and sing "The Star-Spangled Banner" if he wanted, and as long as his deposition couldn't be called into question, it would not reflect badly on himself, but only on Metz, who had underestimated his own witness.

  Although it made him uneasy, Metz had been willing to let Fletcher keep his big revelation about Faith White to himself, just so long as he was planning to offer up a few lesser ones for the court. But this flat refusal to cooperate--it just doesn't make any sense. "Surely you've dug up something."

  "Counselor, you wouldn't be asking me to lie, now would you?"

  Metz feels the vein in his temple throb. He tries some different questions, questions they've rehearsed, to see if Fletcher will fall back into line. "Did you ever see Faith White perform a miracle?"

  Ian hesitates for a fraction of a second. "Not precisely," he says.

  "Where were you on the evening of October thirteenth?"

  "Parked on the White property."

  "What happened that night, at about ten P.M.?"

  "I ran into Faith. Literally. She was in the woods, after dark."

  "Did her mother know she was outside?"

  "No," Ian admits.

  "What happened?"

  "She was bleeding. She...passed out, and I carried her to the house. To her mother."

  "Let me get this straight. The child was running around in the dark, bleeding and nearly unconscious, and her mother was unaware?"

  Ian frowns. "Once I brought Faith to Mrs. White, she was extremely responsive. She took Faith to the hospital for immediate medical attention."

  "Is it possible that Faith White was running away because her own mother had hurt her?"

  "Objection!"

  "Overruled," Judge Rothbottam says.

  Ian shrugs. "I didn't see her mother do that."

  "But it is possible?"

  "I didn't see you hurt Faith that night either, Mr. Metz, but I guess it's possible that you did."

  Metz hesitates. He cannot figure out Fletcher's game. They are on the same side--both of them needing to show that the child is a fake--even if they desire that proof for very different reasons. "Can you give us other examples of Mrs. White being an unfit parent?"

  Ian furrows his brow, as if in deep concentration. Then his expression clears, and he smiles at Metz. "Nope. Ma