Stranger in the Night Read Online Free PDF Page A

through.
    “The mother never saw her children again,” she continued. “She was left with one daughter, a thirteen-year-old who had been fetching water from a stream when the rebels attacked. This woman and her daughter walked more than a hundred miles across the Somali desert into Kenya. They lived in a mud hut inside a United Nations refugee camp for five years. They ate gruel and got water from a spigot that served twenty other families. Both gave birth to sons. This mother, her daughter, son and grandson are here now. In St. Louis. Are you with me, Sergeant?”
    “All the way.”
    “Shall I continue?”
    “Go ahead.” His face had grown solemn, but his eyes were not focused on the photographs. He was looking at Liz.
    Disconcerted, she closed the file and set it back on her desk before speaking again.
    “Two weeks ago, I greeted this woman and her family at the airport, Sergeant Duff. I took them to a run-down apartment in a high-rise not far from here. Refugee Hope has prepaid their rent for three months. Within those three months, it’s my jobto make sure this mother learns how to use public transportation, goes to English language classes and attends job training. I have three months to enroll the daughter in a school where no one speaks her language and yet see that she’s able to cope. Three months to ensure that the two babies are brought back to health and provided with adequate day care. I have three months’ worth of funds with which to buy food and clothing. If this family isn’t successfully working, attending school, living independently and eating with proper nutrition in three months, I haven’t done my duty, Sergeant Duff. They’ll be cut loose from Refugee Hope, and no one will follow me to pick up the pieces.”
    She looked into his eyes. The bluster was gone, and in its place, she saw a deep sympathy. A warmth. So unexpected she felt her heart stumble.
    “How many families do you have, ma’am?”
    “Twenty-three current groups. If I don’t get some work done at my desk this morning, I’ll be late to pick up family number twenty-four at Lambert. And you can call me Liz.”
    “Liz.” He was silent for a moment. “I live in Amarillo, Liz. That’s a long way off.”
    “But see, the Rudi family is here now.” She repeated what he had said to her earlier. “So what can you do for them?”
    “You’re good. You’ve trapped me.”
    “I can’t track a sniper over bare rock, but I’m not stupid. You wouldn’t have brought those people here if you didn’t have a compassionate streak. We’re alike in that way. Let me tell you how to help them, Sergeant.”
    “You can call me Joshua.”
    “You’ll enjoy lending a hand, Joshua. Lots more fun than dealing with squabbling sheikhs.”
    He opened his mouth to answer, but the return of Reverend Rudi and his family silenced the Marine.
    Charity and Virtue, it became evident, had discovered Cheetos. Their lips and fingers coated with orange dust, the two children sidled into the cubicle. Liz struggled not to laugh and scoop them up into her arms, as she so often did with the precious little ones who came under her wings of care. But she couldn’t afford to melt. Not now.
    Sergeant Duff needed to take responsibility for this family. His wad of cash would surely buy bus tickets back to Atlanta. He was a good man, kind and concerned. But he had just returned from the war, and his home was in Texas. The last thing he would want to do was take on a group of Pagandans.
    “What’ve you got there?” he asked, hunkering down in front of Virtue. “Let me see those fingers, kiddo.”
    The child glanced up at his father. Pastor Stephen said something in their native tongue, and Virtue held out his hands. When he noticed his orange fingers, the boy gasped and then burst into a gale of giggles. His sister looked at her hands and started laughing, too.
    “Cheetos,” Duff informed the pair. “Puffed or fried, can’t beat ’em. My favorite.”
    He