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cloudy, red-streaked ovals filled
with tears.
    "Oh, it was so terrible. I don't
want to go there again. Where am I? What did I do wrong? I'm so
sorry..." she managed to get out. "Oh, I'm so thirsty...so
thirsty."
    "Mrs. Whitehead, Mrs. Whitehead?
You're in the hospital. I'm Doctor Hyll and this is Doctor Stokes
and Doctor Graber. You were in a car accident and you're going to
be okay."
    "Yes, you are going to be fine,
Mrs. Whitehead. Nothing to worry about," Stokes added.
    "Oh, oh...but the pain. There must
be something wrong. The Lord must be mad at me. I was falling into
a dark tunnel...it was so terrible! Can I have some water
now?"
    "It was just a very bad nightmare,
Mrs. Whitehead," Stokes said. "Nurse?"
    Nurse Doherty poured water out of
the plastic pitcher into a tiny cup and held it up to woman's lips.
She took meager sips.
    "Was there a faint flickering light
at the end of the tunnel?" Carson asked.
    "Oh, yes. And then the pain..." the
old woman said. “I've always been afraid of the pain.”
    Carson walked away from the bed and
stared out the window at the parked cars below. Stokes approached
him.
    "What's the matter? You look like
you've seen a ghost?" Stokes asked.
    "She had the same nightmare I had.
It just doesn't make sense," Carson said.
    "Guilt. That's all it is. Guilt.
You must being feeling guilty about something you did," Graber said
from the bedside. "The mind works in strange ways and so does the
Lord. Maybe she’s being punished on account of you."
    "I don't think so," Carson shot
back. "I don't feel guilty about anything I did in my life past or
present. And how do you explain the blistered, burned skin? They
thought it might be something in the water, but Mrs.
Whitehead...she didn't crash into any river. How do you explain her
symptoms?" Carson walked back to Mrs. Whitehead's bed.
    "I think you’re a little out of
line," Stokes added.
    "Well, Doctor Graber here thinks
her symptoms are divine intervention!" Carson said staring down
Stokes. "How can you say that, Doctor Graber! If most people
thought like you did, we'd still be in the dark ages!"
    Carson stormed out. Stokes started
after him, but stopped and looked at Graber. Nurse Doherty
shrugged.
    "I apologize for that outburst,"
Stokes said. "Doctor Hyll is a bit short tempered these days, and
he's still recovering from that awful car accident. This is his
first day back."
    "It's okay. I understand, Matt.
He's not a native and he doesn't understand our ways, but I'm sure
he'll come around," Graber said. His thin lips parted into a tiny
smile.
    "Yes, our ways..." Stokes replied
staring right through Graber. "Yes, our ways..."
    Nurse Doherty shook her head and
left; Graber followed her.

The Subbasement - Chapter 5

    C arson's
stomach was upset when he finished his shift probably from that
stupid nurse who worked only one day a week. She often forgot the
processes she was supposed to follow, but insisted she had done it
correctly. He could never figure out people who thought absolutely
in black and white and who saw the world with no gray areas. In
addition, he didn't like working Sundays, but people just don't get
mysteriously well on Sundays and then sick again during the week.
When he pulled into the river stone driveway of his 1894 Victorian
home, his wife was just starting to unload grocery bags from the
trunk of her Nisson. Luckily, for both of them they could drive
their cars on Sundays. The use of all vehicles was prohibited on
Sundays in honor of the Sabbath until 1985. The town gates were
chained shut from midnight Saturday until midnight Sunday and no
wheeled vehicles of any sort were used on the town's roads. The
courts ruled that the practice was a conflict between church and
state and the gates had to remain open.
    "I need some help," she shouted to
him on her way into the house with several bags in her
arms.
    "Be right there!" Carson yelled
back. He was exhausted and didn't feel up to carrying grocery bags
into the house.
    He looked