9
The choir resumed
Peter did not wish to count to a million. He was ready now. Pacing his quarters, itching for his rendezvous. His rucksack was packed and he’d already tested its weight on his shoulders. As soon as Grainger was ready to take him, he would go.
His Bible, much annotated, dog-eared and interleaved with paper place-markers, was stashed in the rucksack along with his socks, notebooks and so on. He didn’t need to consult it just now: the relevant verses were deeply engraved in his memory. Psalms was the obvious resource, the first port of call if you needed courage in the face of a huge, possibly dangerous challenge. The valley of the shadow of death. Somehow, he doubted that he was about to be taken there.
But then, he had a very poor instinct for danger. That time in Tottenham when he almost got knifed – he would have just kept talking to that street gang as they grew in number and pressed more closely and aggressively around him, if it hadn’t been for Beatrice whisking him into a minicab.
‘You are completely insane,’ she’d said to him as the doors slammed shut and obscenities ricocheted off the car’s surface.
‘But look, some of them are waving to us,’ he’d protested, as they accelerated away from the mob. She looked, and it was true.
Dear Peter, she wrote.
What thrilling news, that the Oasans have already heard of Jesus. It doesn’t surprise me, though. Remember when I asked USIC what contact there’d been with Christians so far? They were cagey, keen to maintain their ‘USIC is non-religious’ stance. But there must have been quite a few Christians among the personnel over the years and we both know that if you put a real Christian anywhere, things happen! Even the smallest seed can grow.
And now you’re there, my darling, and you can plant more. Many more!