Steal the Lightning: A Field Ops Novel (Field Ops #3)(23)

It was a rock concert.

It struck me, suddenly. It took me right back to my first few shows, in my early teens: the same techniques. You get the audience stretched out almost to breaking point, they’ve waited so long. Then a shadow moves. You can’t tell who it is, but everybody cheers. A couple of hard whacks on the drums. Some tuning up. The rush is there. But it’s only when the singer finally arrives, the lights blaze on, and everyone goes wild—

That’s how Cleary was. The stagecraft was a little different, but the buildup was the same. First, just glimpses, and a thrill that rustled through the audience—was that him? Did you see him? Is he there?

I, too, was craned up in my seat. I saw a tall, thin white man, down behind the choir. He swapped a few words with one of the functionaries there, last-minute instructions, maybe. Then he vanished. A moment later, he was on the other side, heading for the podium—but he stopped, shook hands with this man, spoke a few words to another, touched a woman on the forehead—and the crowd went crazy. People were reaching out, clutching at him, and he’d flash that smile like a blessing, raise a hand . . . Then he was free of them. He sprang onto the podium—the kind of big, dynamic, alpha-male leap that aging politicians try, and don’t always achieve.

He did it perfectly.

Cleary was young (though maybe not all that young) and slender, and his hair was blond and brushed to the side and he wore blue jeans, like so many of his audience, and a pale blue shirt, and as he rose to the lectern everybody in the place was on their feet. Me, Angel—everyone. He raised his hands, he shook his head, but the roar just wouldn’t quit. He let it carry on. Then slowly, and with great significance, he brought his hands together. The crowd began to calm. They knew the routine. Reverend Cleary bowed his head. “Not for me, but for Him . . .” and in the rush of applause, I caught one word over the PA: “. . . pray.”

There was a hush. I found myself staring out at row on row of bowed heads, and, self-consciously, I put my own head down.

Then someone tapped me on the shoulder.

“Can you move up there?”

I looked around. Sometimes it’s weird, seeing a person out of context. I took in the mildly anxious eyes, the long, dark tongue of hair left stranded in the center of his forehead, the loose plaid shirt, and I thought, Why is he looking at me that way?

Then I said, “Silverman . . . ?”





Chapter 21

The Show Begins




I am not a religious man. The job tends to preclude it. But I’ve seen my share of miracles, endured my altered states, and been on first-name terms with entities who might, by common definition of the term, be called divine. Or else infernal. At that level, the difference is entirely down to where you’re standing.

I am not religious. Yet, as a performer, I thought Cleary had some style. He started in a pleasant, down-home manner, to let you know he’d shared the life you lived (at least, if you lived in Big Hollow, he had). He talked about his papa being laid off, and his mom, who (“like so many of you women do”) worked two jobs just to get the family through, but was still a mother and a homemaker—“A saint,” he said. “She makes me humble.” And he talked about his cousin, “practically my twin,” who “fell away,” “got into drugs,” and died, a lost, abandoned soul with no one near to help. And Cleary stood a moment, and he shook his head. “I guess it was the only way the Lord could end his suffering.”

The crowd grew quiet. He waited till he heard them stir. He let them pick the pace; then he moved on. He talked about corruption in the government, bribery from interest groups and secular societies, about sexual deviants, pushing through their anti-Christian laws, and the murderers of unborn babies, and the politicians who took bribes and feathered their own nests at everyone’s expense, and I wondered just how big a haul the Reverend Cleary would wind up with from tonight, because the offertory bags kept coming round, and everyone put money in them, and the more he got the audience worked up, the more the cash kept flowing. I heard gasps and hallelujahs all around. At intervals, some neat, staid-looking gent or lady would spring onto their feet and give a holler for the grace of God. Everyone, it seemed, was having a good time.

Silverman said, “Hang on. There’s a big finish.”

There were three of us now, jammed onto the two chairs. Silverman held up his phone, videoing Cleary and the audience.

“Won’t let me bring a real camera. I tried it first time. They act like everybody’s welcome, but they’re not.”

“First time . . . ?” I said.

“Few weeks back.” He lowered the phone, replayed a few seconds, flicked back to Record. “Then, I heard you’d be here. Say cheese.”

He aimed the phone at me.

“Get that away. And what d’you mean, you heard I’d be here? I didn’t know myself till yesterday.”

A woman behind went, “Shush!” in a voice like a cobra.

To Silverman, I said, “What’s this about?”

“Tell you later.”

“First you turn up with a flask, and now you’re here, and—”

“Hallelujah!” screamed the cobra woman. I daresay she’d been building to it; I hoped we hadn’t put her off her moment.

I said, “And what do you mean, a few weeks back? How long have you been doing this?”