long lonely hours seated in a totally dark room watching the same movies over and over again on television. He desperately missed the action of the field and the purpose it provided him. Despite its falseness, it had at least provided a center for his life, and without that center he felt useless. He needed to feel worthy again; he needed to matter.
The initial solution came to him quite by accident. A former Caretaker he had worked with had become a sheriff in Southern California. His Orange County district was being plagued by a series of stranglings, and he asked for the Ferryman’s help. Kimberlain was reluctant at first, but taking up the chase enabled him to employ the skills he so sorely missed. Now he was in control. His work resulted in the strangler’s capture, and his reward was a deeper understanding of himself. He was a hunter, and a hunter needed to hunt. He began working on his own, uninvited, to track down the most loathsome and offensive of criminals. By the time Kamanski came to him about Peet he had been successful in all but one of his pursuits—finding the man who was doubtless the most devastating killer of them all. A man named Dreighton Quail, known better as the Flying Dutchman.
Kimberlain had stalked the stalker of the nation’s highways and gotten close—but never close enough. Quail, the giant with no face, was still out there. The fire that obliterated his face had started a rampage that ultimately claimed over a hundred lives.
And Peet too might still have been free if not for him. To track down these most monstrous of criminals he had to enter their thoughts, and even before Peet, the hate was telling on him. He had thought that tracking them down would somehow vindicate him for his actions as a Caretaker. Yet their victims were just as dead as his were. He lay in the hospital those long weeks after his encounter with Peet and considered the track his life was on, no longer satisfied with it. Everything was death; his entire existence was defined by it. Nothing had changed and nothing would until he found a way to breathe life back into himself. Through others who lacked a vent for their own hate.
And the paybacks began. Slowly at first, until word leaked out and he was flooded with more requests man he could fill. There was no way to reach him except a post office box. But word continued to spread. People with a need for his services always seemed able to find him, and he helped them because the process allowed him to help himself. How many lives had he taken or destroyed as a Caretaker? Kimberlain hadn’t counted back then, just as now he didn’t count the specific number of people helped by his paybacks. He knew there was a balance to be achieved, and he would feel it when it was reached. Until then, the paybacks would continue.
But for now there was Lisa Eiseman and a stubborn resolve to keep her alive. From the first of Peet’s letters he had begun to feel there was something here that would lead him to the greatest payback of all.
Beyond the window, Atlanta’s Hartsfield International Airport sharpened in view.
Chapter 10
“IF THERE’S NOTHING ELSE, I’ll see you all at the demonstration in one hour,” Lisa Eiseman said to close the meeting. “Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.”
The eleven department heads who reported to her waited for the chief executive of TLP Industries to rise before easing their chairs back. The gesture was born out of respect for a person they could call a friend as well as an employer. In fact, everyone from the workers at the company’s Atlanta headquarters to the assemblers in four factories across the country to the drivers who trucked the finished products felt the same way. Lisa Eiseman had at one time or another shaken the hand of everyone who worked for her, and in that moment each had felt more than a simple grasp.
They felt that she cared. About them. And in return their loyalty to the woman who sat in the president’s
The initial solution came to him quite by accident. A former Caretaker he had worked with had become a sheriff in Southern California. His Orange County district was being plagued by a series of stranglings, and he asked for the Ferryman’s help. Kimberlain was reluctant at first, but taking up the chase enabled him to employ the skills he so sorely missed. Now he was in control. His work resulted in the strangler’s capture, and his reward was a deeper understanding of himself. He was a hunter, and a hunter needed to hunt. He began working on his own, uninvited, to track down the most loathsome and offensive of criminals. By the time Kamanski came to him about Peet he had been successful in all but one of his pursuits—finding the man who was doubtless the most devastating killer of them all. A man named Dreighton Quail, known better as the Flying Dutchman.
Kimberlain had stalked the stalker of the nation’s highways and gotten close—but never close enough. Quail, the giant with no face, was still out there. The fire that obliterated his face had started a rampage that ultimately claimed over a hundred lives.
And Peet too might still have been free if not for him. To track down these most monstrous of criminals he had to enter their thoughts, and even before Peet, the hate was telling on him. He had thought that tracking them down would somehow vindicate him for his actions as a Caretaker. Yet their victims were just as dead as his were. He lay in the hospital those long weeks after his encounter with Peet and considered the track his life was on, no longer satisfied with it. Everything was death; his entire existence was defined by it. Nothing had changed and nothing would until he found a way to breathe life back into himself. Through others who lacked a vent for their own hate.
And the paybacks began. Slowly at first, until word leaked out and he was flooded with more requests man he could fill. There was no way to reach him except a post office box. But word continued to spread. People with a need for his services always seemed able to find him, and he helped them because the process allowed him to help himself. How many lives had he taken or destroyed as a Caretaker? Kimberlain hadn’t counted back then, just as now he didn’t count the specific number of people helped by his paybacks. He knew there was a balance to be achieved, and he would feel it when it was reached. Until then, the paybacks would continue.
But for now there was Lisa Eiseman and a stubborn resolve to keep her alive. From the first of Peet’s letters he had begun to feel there was something here that would lead him to the greatest payback of all.
Beyond the window, Atlanta’s Hartsfield International Airport sharpened in view.
Chapter 10
“IF THERE’S NOTHING ELSE, I’ll see you all at the demonstration in one hour,” Lisa Eiseman said to close the meeting. “Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.”
The eleven department heads who reported to her waited for the chief executive of TLP Industries to rise before easing their chairs back. The gesture was born out of respect for a person they could call a friend as well as an employer. In fact, everyone from the workers at the company’s Atlanta headquarters to the assemblers in four factories across the country to the drivers who trucked the finished products felt the same way. Lisa Eiseman had at one time or another shaken the hand of everyone who worked for her, and in that moment each had felt more than a simple grasp.
They felt that she cared. About them. And in return their loyalty to the woman who sat in the president’s
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