The Omen

Let He who hath understanding Reckon the number of the Beast; For it is a human number, Its number is Six Hundred and Sixty-Six.

-BOOK OF REVELATIONS

It happened in a millisecond. A movement in the galaxies that should have taken eons occurred in the blinking of an eye.

At the Cape Hattie observatory a young astronomer sat stunned, reaching an instant too late to activate the camera that might have recorded it: the splintering of three constellations that produced the dark, glowing star. From Capricorn, Cancer, and Leo pieces had suddenly flown, finding each other with magnetic certainty, melding into a pulsating galactic ember. It grew brighter now and the constellations shuddered—or was it trembling hands on the eyepiece as the astronomer struggled to stifle his confused cry?

He feared he was alone with it, but in fact he was not. For from the very bowels of the earth there came a distant sound. It was the sound of voices; human, yet not, growing in devout cacophony with the heightening potency of the star. In caves, basements, and open fields they had gathered; midwives to the birth, some twenty thousand strong. With hands joined and heads bowed, their voices rose until the vibration could be heard and felt everywhere. It was the sound of the OHM, ringing upward to the heavens and inward to the pre-biblical core of the earth.

It was the sixth month, the sixth day, the sixth hour. The precise moment predicted by the Old Testament when earth history would change. The wars, the turmoil of recent centuries had been mere rehearsals, a testing of the climate to determine when mankind would be ready to be led. Under Caesar they had cheered while Christians were fed to the lions, and

under Hitler while Jews were reduced to charred remains. Now democracy was fading, mind-impairing drugs had become a way of life, and in the few countries where freedom of worship was still allowed, it was widely proclaimed that God was dead. From Laos to Lebanon brother had turned against brother, fathers against children; school busses and marketplaces exploded daily in the growing din of preparatory lust.

Students of the Bible had seen it too, the falling into place of biblical symbols that heralded the event that was now at hand. In the form of the Common Market, the Holy Roman Empire had risen, and with the statehood of Israel the Jews had returned to the Promised Land. This, coupled with worldwide famine and the disintegration of international economic structure, demonstrated more than a mere coincidence of events. Clearly it was a conspiracy of events. The Book of Revelations had predicted it all.

As, high in the sky, the black star grew brighter, the chant grew louder, and the basalt center of the planet reverberated with its power. Within the hollowed-out ruins of the ancient city of Meggido, the old man Bugenhagen could feel it, and wept; his scrolls and tablets useless now. And above him on the desert floor outside of Israel the night shift of archaeological students paused in their work, their dirt-sifters falling silent as the ground beneath them began to tremble.

In his first-class seat aboard the 747 bound from Washington to Rome, Jeremy Thorn felt it too and routinely fastened his seat belt, preoccupied with what awaited him below. Even if he had known the reason for the sudden turbulence, it would have been too late. For at that moment, in the basement of the Ospedale Generale in Rome, a stone crushed the head of the child that was meant to be his.

At any given moment there are over a hundred thousand people in airplanes in the sky. It was the kind of statistic that intrigued Thorn, and as he read it in the Skyliner magazine he instantly cleaved the human population between those on the earth and those in the air. Normally he was given to more serious musing, but on this particular flight he grasped at anything to keep his mind off the uncertainty that he was heading for. What the statistic meant was that if suddenly the earth-bound population were to be annihilated, there would be over a hundred thousand of them left aloft, sipping martinis and watching movies, unaware that all had been lost.

As his plane lumbered through the troubled skies over Rome, he wondered how many of them up there at this moment were male, and how many were female, and how, if they all found a safe haven to land in, they would go about reconstructing a society. Probably most were male, in the middle to upper economic bracket, which meant they would possess skills that were relatively useless if they returned to an earth where all the working men were gone. Managers with no one to manage, accountants with no one to account. It might be a good idea if a few planeloads of maintenance men and construction workers were kept aloft at all times so there would be ample muscle to begin again. Wasn't it Mao Tse-tung who said it? It is the country with the best maintenance men that would best survive a holocaust.

The plane's hydraulics wheezed beneath his feet and Thorn extinguished his cigarette, gazing out at the lights dimly visible below. With all his traveling in recent months this had become a familiar sight, but tonight it brought anxiety. The telegram he'd received in Washington was twelve hours old and by now whatever had happened was over. He would find Katherine fulfilled at last, in a hospital bed nursing their newborn child, or in a state of hopeless despair at having lost it once again. Unlike the other two pregnancies that had ended after just a few months, this one had gone all the way to eight. And if this time something went wrong, he knew that Katherine would be lost.

They had been together almost since childhood, he and Katherine, and even then at the age of seventeen, her instability was plain. The haunted eyes, begging for someone to protect her; the role of protector suiting his needs as well. It was this that formed the very core of their relationship, but in recent years as his responsibilities began to extend far beyond her, she had been left behind, lonely and isolated, unable to cope with the duties of a politician's wife.

The first signal of her distress had gone almost unnoticed, Thorn expressing anger instead of concern when he returned home to find she had taken a scissors and fairly butchered her hair. A Sassoon wig covered it until it grew out, but a year later he found her in their bathroom making small cuts in the end of her fingers with a razor blade, dismayed herself at why she was doing it. It was then that they sought help; a psychiatrist who merely sat in bland silence. She quit him after a month, deciding that all she needed was a child.

Impregnation occurred immediately, and the three months of that first pregnancy were the best they had ever known. Katherine looked and felt beautiful and even traveled to the Far East at her husband's side. The pregnancy ended in the lavatory of an airplane, blue water washing away her hope as she cried.

The second pregnancy took two years to accomplish and all but destroyed the sex life that had once been a pillar of their relationship. The fertility specialist had pinpointed the right moment in her estrus cycle at a time of day that was difficult for Thorn to be with her, and he had felt foolish and used as month after month he left his office to perform the perfunctory, mechanical task. It was even suggested that he masturbate so that his semen could be injected artificially, but here he drew the line. If a child were that important to her, she could adopt. But she would have none of it. The child had to be their own.

In the end one lonely cell found another, and for five and a half months hope again bloomed. This time the pains began in a supermarket and Katherine doggedly continued her shopping, trying to deny it until it could be denied no longer. It was a blessing, they said, because the fetus was impaired, but this only furthered her despair and she slipped into a depression that took six months to relieve. It was the third time now, and Thorn knew it was the last. If something went wrong this time, it would be the end of her sanity.

The plane touched down on the runway and there was a spattering of light applause, an open admission that the passengers were delighted, even somewhat surprised, to have made it back down alive. Why do we fly? wondered Thorn. Is life all that dispensable? He remained in his seat as others groped for their carry-ons, crushing toward the door. He would be VIP'd off, taken quickly through customs, into a waiting car. It was the nicest part of coming back to Rome, for here he was something of a celebrity. As the President's economic advisor, he was chairman of the World Economy Conference which had been moved from Zurich to Rome. The initial four-week agenda had droned on now for close to six months, and in that time the paparazzi had begun to notice him, the rumor spreading that in a few years hence he himself would be a U.S. Presidential hopeful.

At the age of forty-two, he was in his prime, having carefully paved the way for what now seemed inevitable. His appointment as chairman of the Economy Conference put him in the public eye, providing a stepping-stone to an ambassadorship, a cabinet position, then, probably, elected office. That the man who was now President of the United States was once his college roommate was no hindrance, but actually Thorn had done it on his own.

The family industrial plants that boomed during the war had provided him with the best education money could buy and potentially a life of ease. But at his father's death he closed them down, defying his advisors in the vow never again to foster implements of destruction. All war is fratricide. It was Adlai Stevenson who said it, Thorn who quoted it, and in the interest of peace the Thorn fortune multiplied. Real estate holdings evolved into construction, Thorn becoming passionately involved with improving ghetto areas and dispensing small business loans to the capable and needy. It was this that made him unique; a gift for accumulating money and a sense of responsibility for those who had none. The estimate that his personal wealth was close to a hundred million dollars was unverifiable, and in truth Thorn himself did not know. To account would have meant to pause, and Jeremy Thorn was in constant motion.

As the taxi stopped short in front of the darkened Ospedale Generale, Father Spilletto gazed down from his second-floor office window, knowing in an instant that the man bounding out was Jeremy Thorn. The rugged jaw and graying temples were familiar from newspaper photos, the attire and gait seemed familiar as well. It was satisfying that Thorn looked every inch what he should. Plainly, the choice had been right. Drawing his robes around him, the priest stood, his enormous form dwarfing the small wooden desk before him, and, without expression, moved quietly to the door. Thorn's footsteps could already be heard below, entering, echoing as they moved vigorously across the bare, tiled floor.

"Mr. Thorn?"

Below him, Thorn turned, his eyes searching upward in the darkness.

"Yes?"

"I am Father Spilletto. I sent you ..."

"Yes. I got your telegram. I left as soon as I could."

The priest moved into a shaft of light and started down the stairwell. There was something in his movement, the silence that surrounded it, that signaled all was not well.

"Is ... the child born?" asked Thorn.

"Yes."

"My wife . . . ?"

"She is resting."

The priest was at the base of the stairwell now and his eyes met Thorn's, trying to prepare him, to soften the blow.

"Something's gone wrong," said Thorn.

"The child is dead."

There came an awesome silence, the empty tiled corridors seeming to ring with it, as Thorn stood paralyzed, as though hit by a body blow.

"It breathed but a moment," whispered the priest, "then breathed no more."

The priest watched, unmoving, as the man before him walked stiffly to a bench and sat for a long moment, then bowed his head and wept. The sound of weeping echoed through the corridors, and the priest waited his turn to speak.

"Your wife is safe," he said, "but she will be unable to bear another child."

"It will destroy her," whispered Thorn.

"You could adopt."

"She wanted her own."

In the silence that followed, the priest stepped forward. His features were coarse but composed, the eyes filled with compassion. Only a trickle of perspiration betrayed the tension hidden within.

"You love her very much," he said.

Thorn nodded, unable to find his voice.

"Then you must accept God's plan."

From the shadows of a darkened corridor, an aged nun appeared, her eyes imploring the priest to join her. They came together, whispering for a moment in Italian before she departed and the priest turned again to Thorn. There was something in his eyes that made Thorn stiffen.

"God works in mysterious ways, Mr. Thorn." And he held out his hand. Thorn, rising, was compelled to follow.

The maternity ward was three floors up and they took a back stairwell, an avenue little used and lit only by bare bulbs. The ward itself was dark and clean, the smell of babies renewing the sense of loss that throbbed like a hammer deep in Thorn's stomach. Moving to a glass partition, the priest paused, waiting as Thorn hesitantly approached and gazed down at what lay on the other side. It was a child. Newborn. A child of angelic perfection. With thick black hair tousled above deep-set blue eyes it stared upward, instinctively finding Thorn's eyes.

"It is a foundling," said the priest. "Its mother died as your own child ... in the same hour." Confused, Thorn turned to him. "Your wife needs a child," continued the priest. "The child needs a mother."

Thorn slowly shook his head. "We wanted our own," he said.

"If I may suggest... it very much resembles ..."

And Thorn looked again, realizing it was true. The child's coloration was the same as Katherine's, the features resembled his own. The jaw was firm, it even had the unique Thorn cleavage in its chin.

"The Signora need never know," implored the priest

And from Thorn's sudden silence, he took heart. Thorn's hand had begun to tremble and the priest took it, infusing him with confidence.

"Is ... it a healthy child?" asked Thorn in a trembling voice.

"Perfect in every way."

"Are there relatives?"

"None."

Around them the empty corridors hissed with silence, a stillness so dense that it assaulted the ears.

"I am in full authority here," said the priest. "There will be no records. No one would know."

Thorn averted his eyes, desperate with indecision.

"Could I... see my own child?" he asked.

"What's to be gained?" implored the priest. "Give your love to the living."

And from behind the glass partition the infant lifted both arms toward Thorn as if in a gesture of desire.

"For the sake of your wife, Signor, God will forgive this deception. And for the sake of this child who will otherwise have no home .. ."

His voice fell to silence, for no more needed to be said.

"On this night, Mr. Thorn ... God has given you a son."

In the night skies above them the black star reached its apex, suddenly shattered by an angry bolt of lightning. And in her hospital bed Katherine Thorn thought she was awakening naturally, unaware of the injection she had been given just moments before. She had suffered ten hours of labor and had felt the final contractions, but she slipped into unconsciousness before she could see the child. Now, as her faculties returned, she was gripped with fear but fought to calm herself as she heard footsteps approaching from the corridor outside. The door swung open and she saw her husband. And in his arms was a child.

"Our child," said Thorn, his voice trembling with emotion. "We've got our son."

She reached out and took the baby, and wept with joy. And as he watched through blurred eyes, Thorn thanked God for showing him the way.