Revival by Stephen King Page B

my courage and went to the shed. He was putting electronic equipment into a wooden orange crate, using large sheets of crumpled-up brown paper for padding, and didn’t see me at first. He was dressed in jeans and a plain white shirt. The notched collar was gone. Children aren’t very observant about the changes in adults, as a rule, but even at nine I could see he’d lost weight. He was standing in a shaft of sunlight, and when he heard me come in, he looked up. There were new lines on his face, but when he saw me and smiled, the lines disappeared. That smile was so sad it put an arrow in my heart.
    I didn’t think, just ran to him. He opened his arms and lifted me up so he could kiss me on the cheek. “Jamie!” he cried. “Thou art Alpha and Omega!”
    â€œHuh?”
    â€œRevelation, chapter one, verse eight. ‘I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.’ You were the first kid I met when I came to Harlow, and you’re the last. I’m so very, very glad you came.”
    I started to cry. I didn’t want to but couldn’t help it. “I’m sorry, Reverend Jacobs. I’m sorry for everything. You were right in church, it’s not fair.”
    He kissed my other cheek and set me down. “I don’t think I said that in so many words, but you certainly caught the gist of it. Not that you should take anything I said seriously; I was off my head. Your mother knew that. She told me so when she brought me that fine Thanksgiving feast. And she wished me all the best.”
    Hearing that made me feel a little better.
    â€œShe gave me some good advice, too—that I should go far from Harlow, Maine, and start over. She said I might find my faith again in some new place. I strongly doubt that, but she was right about leaving.”
    â€œI’ll never see you again.”
    â€œNever say that, Jamie. Paths cross all the time in this world of ours, sometimes in the strangest places.” He took his handkerchief from his back pocket and wiped the tears from my face. “In any case, I’ll remember you. And I hope you’ll think of me from time to time.”
    â€œI will.” Then, remembering: “You betchum bobcats.”
    He went back to his worktable, now sadly bare, and finished packing up the last items—a couple of big square batteries he called “dry cells.” He closed the lid of the crate and began tying it shut with two stout pieces of rope.
    â€œConnie wanted to come with me to say thank you, but he’s got . . . um . . . I think it’s soccer practice today. Or something.”
    â€œThat’s okay. I doubt if I really did anything.”
    I was shocked. “You brought his voice back, for criminey sakes! You brought it back with your gadget!”
    â€œOh yes. My gadget.” He knotted the second rope, and yanked it tight. His sleeves were rolled up, and I could see he had awesome muscles. I had never noticed them before. “The Electrical Nerve Stimulator.”
    â€œYou ought to sell it, Reverend Jacobs! You could make a mint!”
    He leaned an elbow on the crate, propped his chin on one hand, and gazed at me. “Do you think so?”
    â€œYes!”
    â€œI doubt it very much. And I doubt if my ENS unit had anything to do with your brother’s recovery. You see, I built it that very day.” He laughed. “And powered it with a very small Japanese-made motor filched from Morrie’s Roscoe Robot toy.”
    â€œReally?”
    â€œReally. The concept is valid, I feel sure of that, but such proto­types—built on the fly, without any experiments to verify the steps in between—very rarely work. Yet I believed I had a chance, because I never doubted Dr. Renault’s original diagnosis. It was a stretched nerve, no more than that.”
    â€œBut—”
    He hoisted the crate. The muscles in his arms bulged, veins standing out on them.