Gideon - 03 - Religious Conviction by Grif Stockley Page A

out. I can’t imagine it now. Why is she coming out here? Yet why shouldn’t she be? It hasn’t been that long since she admitted to me she’d had an abortion in the last year. As traumatic as that must be, that would definitely get you to wondering if your compass was pointed toward north.
    “That’s true,” I admit.
    “Don’t be a stranger,” she says, as I get into the Blazer. I wave as I drive off, wondering if when I get home there will be a note from Woogie to the effect that he has run off to join a Christian dog sect.
     
    “Sarah’s an impressive young woman,” Shane Norman tells me the next morning in my office.
    “Since so many other kids her age are concerned only with themselves and their friends, which is natural from a developmental point of view, she’s quite extraordinary.”
    I unwrap a lemon drop and slip it into my mouth. Un like his daughter, Norman is sparing no effort to cooperate in Leigh’s defense. Having called Chet at home last night, who told him to talk with me as soon as possible, he was waiting for me when I got to work. His wife is a no-show. Still on the booze, I guess.
    “She’s been searching pretty hard for most of the last year,” I say cautiously, not wanting to offend Norman. I was relieved to find out when Sarah came home yesterday that Norman had not put the hard sell on her. After learning she was Catholic, he responded by telling her that as much as Christian Life would be delighted to have her, she needed to think a little bit more about whether she was truly ready to leave her Roman Catholic faith.
    “Most kids, not all, don’t feel a spiritual need at that age,” Norman says, as if he were talking to a colleague.
    “When you find one like Sarah, every word becomes important. They take you so seriously that you feel under the gun to find just the right tone with them.”
    Disarmed by his apparent genuine humility, I say, “You should try being her father. She’s pretty sensitive these days. Everything I say or do goes under a micro scope.”
    Norman, now that I see him at a distance of less than fifty yards, is attractive in a craggy sort of way. His jaw juts out sharply, and his cheekbones are prominent under a high forehead that is crowned by a widow’s peak of brown hair. He doesn’t look a thing like Leigh except in his dark eyes.
    “We forget sometimes,” he gently reminds me, “that kids that age are just as hard on themselves.”
    I wait for the inevitable “Do you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior?” but decide I won’t get it from this guy. Dressed in a blue business suit and fancy silk tie, he could pass for a bond lawyer. I have to give the man credit. He seems genuinely interested in Sarah’s welfare at a difficult time in his own life. I realize I have been feeling like an errant member of his congregation, when, in fact, he needs much more help with his own daughter than I do with mine. I say, “I’m sure Chet and Leigh both told you I visited with her last week.
    Frankly, I haven’t learned a whole lot, since Leigh didn’t have much to say.”
    Norman rubs his mouth with his right hand as if his lips are burning. Shaking his head, he says, “Surely, if Leigh is involved, it had to be self-defense. Her husband wasn’t at all what he seemed.”
    The lemony taste of the candy is irresistible, and I crunch into it. My teeth are congenitally bad, so I might as well finish them off. It dawns on me that Norman is assuming that Leigh is lying. He thinks she did it. I am amazed that he could think his own daughter capable of murder, but why not? He raised her.
    “Leigh admitted the only reason Art joined Christian Life was so he could marry her.”
    Norman, who only moments before seemed so benevolent, says angrily, “Leigh hardly participated in anything at church after they married. He couldn’t have been any more effective in separating her from Christian Life if he had been the Devil himself.”
    I take another lemon